Tee 

■M  16 


UWiO  GOA8T 
MISTOHY 


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Ancient  Chinese  Account  of  the  Grand 
Canyon,  or  Course  of  the  Colorado 


(Copyrighted,  Brooklyn,  1913) 
By  ALEXANDER  M* ALLAN 


TEN  SUNS  IN  THE  SKY  I 

The  ancient  Chinese  records  tell  of  a  "Place  of  Ten  Suns,"  where  "Ten 
Suns  rose  and  shone  together"  (see  Appendix,  note  1 ). 

Seven  Suns  were  also  seen  shining  together  in  the  sky!  and  at  night  (if  in- 
deed  we  can  call  it  "night")  as  many  as  seven  moons!  (What  a  haunt  for  lovers 
and  poets!) 

Five  Suns  were  also  beheld  (see  note  2). 

What  Liars  those  Chinese  writers  are  ! 

Very  good;  but  why  not  denounce  all  our  own 


Figure  I .     Spectacle  of  Five  Suns. 

Arctic  navigators  as  a  pack  of  Liars?  They  all  tell  about  more  Suns  than 
one!  A  picture  of  Five  (see  Figure  I)  is  furnished  by  a  most  eminent  explorer 
(note  3).  The  dictionaries  and  cyclopedias  of  our  careful  publishers  call  the 
appearance  of  two  or  more  suns  (or  moons)  a  Parhelion.  The  number  of  the 
multiplied  "luminaries"  never  exceeds  Ten  (note  4)  There  actually  is  a  "Place 
of  Ten  Suns." 

Ten  Suns  say  the  Ancients. 

Ten  Suns  say  the  Moderns. 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


AMERICA  SHAPED  LIKE  A  TREE. 

The  ancient  Mexicans  likened  North  America  to  a  Tree — a  stupendous 
Mulberry  Tree — "planted  in  the  land  known  to  us  today  as  South  America" 
(n.  5). 

The  Chinese  geographers  or  mythologists  teach  that  at  a  distance  of  30,000 
le  (10,000  miles)  to  the  east  there  Is  a  land  10,000  le  (over  3,000)  miles  in  width. 

Now  the  land  referred  to  must  be  North  America,  for,  10,000  miles  east 
from  southern  China  brings  us  to  California;  and  we  further  find  that  North 
America,  now  reached,  is  10,000  le,  or  over  3,000  miles  in  width,  measuring 
from  the  Pacific  to  the  Atlantic. 

The  Chinese  accounts  further  call  our  eastern  realm  a  Fu-Sang  (or  Help- 
ful Mulberry)  land. 

A  Mulberry  land  (3,090  miles  wide)  is  There,  say  the  Chinese. 

The  Mulberry  land  (3,000  miles  wide)  is  Here,  say  the  Mexicans. 

Like  the  Mexicans,  the  Chinese  sages  declare  that  there  Is  an  enormous 
Tree— the  Fu  (or  helpful)  Sang  Tree-  -in  the  eastern  Mulberry  land  3,000 
miles  wide. 

As  just  remarked,  the  Chinese  call  the  enormous  Eastern  Tree  a  Sang, 
and  the  Mexicans  call  their  enormous  Tree  a  Beb  (both  terms  standing  for  the 
Mulberry,  — a  fact  to  which  no  writer  hitherto  has  directed,  or  called,  attention.) 

Observe  (see  Figure  2)  that  at  Tehauntepec  (a  little  w^est  of  Yucatan)  our 
continent  narrows  down  to  a  width  of  100  miles  (or  300  Chinese  le). 

The  Mexicans  say  that  North  America  Is  a  Tree,  and  that  It  has  a  corres- 
pondingly enormous  Trunk, — which  at  Tehauntepec  measures  100  miles  (or 
300  Chinese  le). 

Now  the  Chinese  writers  declare  that  the  enormous  Mulberry  in  the  region 
east  of  the  Flowery  Kingdom  has  "a  Trunk  of  300  le"  (or  100  miles.)  What  a 
prodigious  dimension  I     (see  note  5.) 

A  Mulberry  Tree,  wilh  a  "Trunk  of  300  le,"  is  There,  say  the  Chinese. 

A  Mulberry  Tree,  with  a  Trunk  of  300  le,  is  Here,  say  the  Mexicans. 

Such  a  stupendous  Tree  ought  to  have  enormous  Branches  to  match  the 
Trunk,  and  we  are  not  surprised  when  informed  that  our  monarch  of  the  forest 
goes  up— up— up  even  to  the  Place  of  the  10  Suns  (in  the  Arctic  zone.) 

The  One  true  sun  is,  of  course,  high  above  the  mountain  ranges,  or 
"Branches"  of  our  Continental  Mulberry. 

But  the  extra  Nine  are  false  or  delusive  and  mere  refljctions  of  the  true 
sun  on  fog  or  vapor.  The  Chinese  account,  truly  enough,  states  that  they  bear 
wu,  and  this  term  stands  for  "blackness,"  "inky,"  or  "dark"  (Williams  diet.  p. 
1058.) 

This  identical  term  wu  also  stands  for  black  or  dark  fowls,  such  as  the 
raven,  blackbird,  and  crow;  and  one  Oriental  scholar,  dwelling  indeed  in  Japan, 
assures  us  that  each  of  the  Nine  Suns  fcears  a  Crow!  We  are  seriously  in- 
formed, that  "all  bear— literally  cause  to  ride— a  Crow"  (note  7.) 

As  well  might  It  be  asserted  that  because  wu  signifies  "black,"  the  Nine 
Wu  borne  by  the  Suns  must  be  nine  blacks  or  negroes!     The  supposition  that 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


Nine  Crows  are  meant  is  absurd    and   contradicted   by   the   luminaries   them- 
selves. 

Strange  to  say,  the  "luminaries"  emit  no  radiance !  The  light  that  is  in 
them  is  darkness,  and  they  are  fitting  symbols  for  commentators — black,  white, 
yellow,  and  green — who  have  written  learnedly  and  positively  on  them'  with- 
out understanding  a  thing  about  thern.  Perhaps  it  might  be  w^ell,  apart  from 
its  inconvenience,  when  writing  about  any  nation,  place,  or  natural  object,  to 
ascertain  the  position  and  name  of  the  continent  in  which  the  subject  of  study 
is  situated.  Of  course  we  are  not  so  unreasonable  as  to  insist  that  we  must 
really  comprehend  a  matter  before  getting  up  to  explain  it  to  others,  but  the 
positions  of  continents  dealt  with  ought,  as  a  rule,  to  be  clearly  ascertained.     In 


or 


^'£iO, OVtU  tast  jrom      7* 

Trunk     0}    '°^   >nilt* 


Figure  2.     Our  Continental  American  Tree. 

the  present  instance  we  have  faithfully  followed  the  ancient  directions  and 
groped  our  way  into  the  presence  of  the  Nine  blind  suns.  Gazing  at  their 
beaming  disks  we  perceive  how  the  term  wu  ( black  or  dark)  applies  to  them. 
The  color  of  Crows  is  there,  but  not  the  living  birds  themselves.  It  is  the 
story  of  the  Three  Black  Crows  advanced  another  stage  on  its  career  of  misrep- 
resentation, and  magnified  Threefold.  The  Nine  Suns  have  neither  swallowed 
nor  disgorged  Nine  Black  Crows.  But  they  are  certainly  open  to  the  charge  of 
having  feasted  too  freely  on  diet  no  less  dark  and  deceptive. 

They're  the  color  of  Crows,  say  the  Ancients. 

They  bear  Nine  Crows,  say  the  Moderns. 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


The  truth  is  that  the  false  suns  furnish  neither  heat  nor  light  and  really 
consist  of  dark  (wu)  vapor. 

The  Nine  are  mere  reflections  of  the  low-declined,  true  sun  on  "surround- " 
ing"  frozen  haze  or  mist,  in  extremely  cold  weather.  When  this  icy  fog  seems 
— merely  seems,  of  course, — to  touch  and  surround  the  true  sun,  the  illusions 
known  as  false  suns  are  apt  to  appear.  They  obey  some  optical  code  of  laws 
or  signals  understood  best  perhaps  by  themselves,  and  will  sometimes  disap- 
pear in  a  moment  like  a  flock  of  timid  "sun  birds"  (or  wild  geese — see  note  8.) 
Their  design  apparently  is  to  cheer  and  escort  their  illustrious  sire  in  his  other- 
wise lonesome  trip  through  a  frozen,  desolate  zone.  Some  Chinese  accounts 
call  them  "children" — "children  of  the  sun,"  etc.,  etc. 

There  is  a  reference  to  this  frozen  mist,  in  Verne's  "Fur  Country,"  reading 
as  follows:  "It  is  not  a  mist  or  fog,*  he  said  to  his  companions,  *it  is  frost-rime,* 
a  dense  vapor  which  remains  in  a  state  of  complete  congelation.  But  whether 
a  fog  or  a  frozen  mist,  this  phenomenon  was  none  the  less  to  be  regretted  for  it 
rose  a  hundred  feet  at  least  above  the  level  of  the  sea,  and  it  was  so  opaque 
that  the  colonists  could  not  see  each  other  when  only  two  or  three  paces 
apart.** — Danvers*  translation,  p.  288. 

It  should  be  remarked  that  the  frozen  haze  which  breeds  the  false  suns  is 
found  only  "at  the  bottom  of,"  or  "below,"  the  mountain  ranges  or  "branches" 
of  our  North  American  Mulberry  Tree.  The  false  suns  speedily  disappear 
from  the  view  of  the  observer  who  climbs  up  out  of  the  thick  stratum  of  frozen 
fog  or  mist  and  ascends  the  nearest  "Branch." 

Such  observations  are  completely  in  accord  w^ith  the  ancient  Chinese 
declaration  that  Nine  of  the  suns  are  to  be  seen  "below"  I'hia)  or  "at  the  bot- 
tom of"  the  Branches,  and  One  "above"  the  Branches.  The  suns  (see  note  9) 
are  not  said  to  be  "in  the  Branches."  Nine  are  "below"  (hia)  and  One 
"above"  (shang);  a  remark  as  true  today  as  it  ever  was. 

The  "Morea**  (about  fifty  miles  long),  in  Greece,  was  so  named  because  it 
was  supposed  to  resemble  the  leaf  of  a  morus  or  mulberry.  And  similarly 
North  America  was  considered  by  Mexican  and  Chinese  mythologists  to  exhibit 
some  resemblance  to  a  mulberry, — the  Helpful  Mulberry  (or  Fu-Sang).  The 
one  comparison  is  just  as  fanciful  or  reasonable  as  the  other.  Nor  can  it  be 
denied  that  North  America  presents  some  likeness  to  a  Tree, — towering  aloft 
like  the  Tree  of  the  Prophet  Daniel,  which  was  seen  from  the  ends  of  the 
earth.  Here  Columbia  lights  up  her  Tree  and  welcomes  the  Neighbors  with 
a  smile. 

The  Chinese  note  concerning  the  extra  suns  and  moons,  which  frequently 
flit  about  and  disappear,  like  so  many  sun-birds,  connects  them  with  the 
"Branches'*  of  the  Fu  (or  Fu-Sang)  Tree  of  amazing  proportions,  which  flour- 
ishes in  the  Region  east  of  the  Eastern  Sea.  The  Fu-Sang  land,  10,000^  le  (or 
3.000  miles  wide)  is  said  to  be  30,000  le  (10.000  miles)  to  the  east  of  China; 
and  this  indeed  is  the  distance  from  Canton  t6  California.  A  lesser  distance 
(20,000  le,  or  7,00 J  miles)  lies  between  Northern  China  and  the  American 
Mulberry  land  due  east.  It  is  in  America  that  we  are  directed  to  search  for  the 
surplas  assemblage  of  suns.     And  do  we  not  find    both    them    and    Fu-Sang  ? 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


(See  note  10. )  In  what  respect  is  the  Chinese  account  inaccurate  thus  far? 
We  are  infcnrmed  that  "in  the  water  is  a  large  tree  having  nine  suns,"  etc.  The 
Trunk  of  this  prodigious  Tree,  which  is  more  or  less  immersed  in  the  Eastern 
Ssa,  furnishes  the  surprising  dimaajioa  of  "30D  le."  And  rising  above  a  Val- 
ley of  Hot  Springs  (readily  found  in  Nicaragua  (the  Tree  proceeds  upward  and 
rears  aloft  its  exalted  Branches  in  the  "Place  of  the  Ten  Suns." 

The  vast  mountain-system,  with  its  tree-like  "Trunk"  and  "Branches,"  on 
which  the  many  suns  and  moons  are  seen  to  alight  or  gambol,  is  called  the 
"Sun  and  Moon  shan"  (shan  signifying  "mountain  or  range")  in  both  the 
Chinese  text  and  the  translation  (see  note  II.)  It  is  identical  with  our  conti- 
n::ntal  stony  Mulberry  and  constitutes  the  form  of  North  America.  Unfortunate- 
ly our  esteemed  translator  was  utterly  in  the  dark  concerning  the  sense  of  the 
curious  statements  regarding  the  manifold  suns  and  moons  and  even  suggested 
that  an  explanation  should  be  sought  for  in  connection  with  the  Philippine 
Islands.  But  the  Tree,  or  range  of  the  Sun  and  Moon,  is  plainly  in  North 
America.     And  here  are  the  flocks  of  Suns  roosting  among  the  Branches. 

NOTICE  OF  OUR  GRAND  CANYON. 

According  to  the  translation,  a  "Great  Canyon"  is  to  be  seen  in  the  "Great 
Eastern  Waste"  "Beyond  the  Eastern  Sea."  And  this  Great  Canyon  is  placed 
in  connection  with  the  "Sun  and  Moon  shan",— which  possesses  the  Mulberry's 
Branches  and  exhibit  of  Suns  already  glanced  at  (note  12.) 

We  read  that  a  stream  flows  through  this  canyon,  "producing  a  charming 
gulf."  We  are  further  informed  that  "the  water  accumulates  and  so  forms  a 
gulf."  A  river  flowing  through  the  "Great  Canyon,"  swells  or  widens  out, 
displays  a  broadening  expanse  of  water  and  becomes  a  Gulf,  a  "Charming 
Gulf." 

Is  not  this  the  beautiful  Gulf  of  California,  which  is  a  widening  out  or 
enlargement  of  a  notable  stream,  the  Colorado?  Decidedly  this  mighty  and 
famous  river,  whose  "water  accumulates  and  so  forms  a  gulf,"  flows  through 
a  Canyon.  Moreover,  this  Canyon  is  truly  a  "Great  Canyon."  It  is  the  greatest 
and  grandest  on  the  planet.  It  is  also  found  in  the  "Great  Waste  to  the  east  of 
the  Eastern  Sea,"  which  washes  the  coast  of  China.  It  is  the  Grand  Canyon  of 
the  Colorado, 

The  translation  informs  us  (note  13)  that  this  stream  which  flows  into,  or 
becomes  a  gulf  has  a  "delightful  spring."  The  Canyon  "has  a  beautiful  moun- 
tain, from  which  there  flows  a  delightful  spring,  producing  a  charming  gulf. 
The  water  accumulates  and  so  forms  a  gulf"  Such  is  the  translation;  but  no 
Chinese  term  for  "spring"  appears  in  the  text.  The  original  states  that  it  is  a 
kan  shui  which  runs  through  the  Canyon,  and  this  identical  compound  is 
translated  "Sweet  River"  by  our  author  on  page  163  of  his  large  and  compre- 
hensive work.  Kan  indaed  signifies  sweat,  sweetness;  delightsome,  pleasant, 
happy,  refreshing;  and  Shui  stands  for  "water  or  river"  (see  Williams  diet.  pp. 
310,781.)  It  is  therefore  evident  that  a  kan  shui  should  be  remarkable  for 
the  sweetness  of  its  water  and  should  start  from  a  "delightful  spring"  of  sweet 
water,  in  o'der  to  be  pure  and  deserve  its  reputation. 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


As  a  geographical  fact,  the  Colorado  flows  out  of  the  very  fount  which 
curiously  enough,  gives  birth  to  the  "Sweet  Water."  This  stream  becomes  the 
Platte  or  Nebraska  river,  which  joins  the  Missouri.  And  from  the  fount  of  the 
Sweet  Water,  exactly  on  the  mountain  divide,  a  head-stream  of  the  Colorado 
bubbles  outienlarging  into  the  affluent  known  as  the  "Green,"  the  stream 
traverses  the  Grand  Canyon  and  connects  with  the  Gulf,  (note  14.) 

It  should  have  a  spring  of  kan  shui  or  sweet  water;  and  we  find  that  it 
comes  sparkling  down  the  mountains  from  a  Sweet  Water  spring. 

The  Sweet  Water  stream  after  traversing  a  Canyon,  even.a  "Great  Canyon** 
should  connect  with,  or  enlarge  into,  a  gulf,  described  as  "charming."  Can  the 
Gulf  of  California  be  regarded  as  charming? 

One  explorer  expresses  himself  as  charmed  and  delighted  with  rhe  scenery 
of  the  gulf.  A  sample  passage  in  his  report  reads  as  follows:  "The  island  and 
mountain  peaks,  whose  outlines,  as  seen  from  the  gulf,  had  b  een  somewhat 
dimmed  by  a  light  haze,  appeared  surprisingly  near  and  distinct  in  the  limpid 
medium  through  which  they  were  now  viewed.  The  whole  panorama  became 
invested  with  new  attractions,  and  it  would  be  hard  to  say  whether  the  dazzling 
radiance  of  the  day  or  the  sparkling  clearness  of  the  night  was  the  more 
beautiful  and  brilliant,  (note  1 5. ) 

Truly  a  charming  and  beautiful  Gulf  is  here.  *    , 

Although  the  translation  does  not  draw  attention  to  the  fact,  the  term  em- 
ployed in  the  Chinese  record  to  describe  the  course  of  the  stream  which  passes 
through  the  Great  Canyon,  is  chu.  Now  this  word  is  employed  to  designate 
water  which  is  "shooting  over  a  ledge"  (Williams'  diet.  p.  89),  and  its  use  is 
entirely  appropriate  in  a  description  of  the  course  of  the  water  in  the  channel 
of  the  Colorado.  The  bed  of  the  stream  is  exceedingly  irregular  and  consists 
indeed  of  a  succession  of  ledges-  -producing  a  series  of  rapids,  falls,  or  catar- 
acts. Were  the  water  to  disappear,  the  exposed  bed  of  the  Colorado,  with  its 
ascending  series  of  steps,  might  be  likened  indeed  with  truth  to  a  stairway  for 
giants  or  gods. 

The  falls  caused  by  ledges  (chu)  are  exceedingly  numerous.  One  navi- 
gator's log  contains  many  such  entries  as  the  following:  "Still  more  rapids  and 
falls  today.  In  one,  the  Emma  Dean  [a  boat]  is  caught  in  a  whirlpool,  and  set 
spinning  about  (n.  16). 

One  subdivision  of  the  Grand  Canyon  is  known  as  Cataract  Canyon,  and 
this  section  "in  its  41  miles,  has  75  rapids  and  cataracts,  and  57  of  these  are 
crowded  into  19  miles,  with  falls,  in  places,  of  16  to  20  feet"  (n.  17.) 

All  accounts  concur  in  representing  the  stream  as  remarkable  for  the  fury 
and  number  of  its  falls.  To  ascend  the  Colorado  is  a  sheer  impossibility  and 
even  to  descend  the  stream  is  an  enterprise  rarely  indeed  attempted  or 
achieved.  Only  rafts  or  life-boats,  backed  by  pluck  and  luck,  stand  a  chance 
of  getting  through— in  pieces.  The  mariners  all  wear  life-belts  and  are  just  as 
often  in  the  water  as  they  are  out  of  it.  Evidently 'a  River  of  Ledges  is  here. 
Surely  the  term  Chu  (or  water  shooting  over  Ledges)  applies  with  peculiar 
force  to  the  career  of  this  "wildest  of  rivers" — the  Colorado. 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


THE  COLORADO-BOTTOMLESS? 

Knowing  quite  well  as  we  do,  that  our  mighty  river  possesses  a  very 
substantial  bottom  composed  of  step-like  ledges  of  rock,  we  learn  with  surprise 
that  it  is  said  to  flow  through  a  section  described  as  bottomless!  Is  not  such 
a  statement  or  assertion  absurd?  But  what  did  the  ancient  writer  mean?  What 
could  he  have  meant? 

The  translation  states  that,  according  to  a  poem,  the  Tsang-shan-wu,  "in 
the  east  there  is  a  stream  flowing  in  a  bottomless  ravine.  It  is  supposed  to 
be  this  Canyon'*— the  "Great  Canyon  of  the  Region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea." 

The  Chinese  term  rendered  "Canyon"  is  Hoh,  which  stands  also  for  "a  bed 
of  a  torrent,  a  deep  gully  or  wady;  a  valley"  (see  Williams  diet.  p.  453.) 

Of  course,  a  Ta  (or  "Great")  Hoh  ought  to  be  a  Great  Canyon,  or  a 
remarkable  deep  gorge  or  valley  containing  the  bed  of  a  torrent. 

We  have  already  been  informed  that  a  Chu  (or  river  of  ledges  and  falls)  is 
in  the  Ta  Hoh,  or  mighty  gorge  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea.  We  also  perceive 
that  the  title  Ta  Hoh  applies  properly  to  the  mountain-hemmed  course  of  our 
Colorado  (which  connects  with  Middle  Park  and  runs  to  the  Gulf.) 

Somewhere  in  this  immense  and  peerless  Ta  Hoh — somewhere  among  the 
majestic  mountains — somewhere  along  the  bed  of  the  Colorado  ( either  inside 
or  outside  of  Middle  Park,)  the  investigator  should  find  a  section  which  is 
bottomless.  The  ancient  account  locates  it  there.  Nor  are  we  to  look  for  it 
in  any  Philippine  Island.  We  are  restricted  to  the  bed  or  banks  of  the  Colorado 
which  we  have  identified  as  the  Chu  or  plunging  river  that  rushes  downward 
to  the  Gulf.  Our  leaping  stream  flows  into  and  out  of  Grand  Lake  (within 
Middle  Park.)  Now  this  Lake  (or  enlargement  of  the  bed  of  the  Grand 
Colorado )  "has  a  beaeh,  and  far  out  into  the  body  of  the  water  a  sandy  bottom" 
and  "in  the  center,  covering  an  area  of  nearly  a  mile  square  the  Lake  to  all 
appearance  is  bottomless."  * 

We  are  further  informed  that  "explorations  of  the  edges  of  this  great  sub- 
marine cavern  give  the  most  positive  evidences  that  it  was  once  the  crater  of  a 
great  volcano"  (note  18). 

"The  Lake  to  all  appearance  is  bottomless.  The  deepest  soundings  that 
could  ever  be  made  have  failed  to  reach  bottom.  Hence  it  is  concluded  that  it 
has  no  bottom." 

Turn  these  two  words,  "no  bottom"  into  Chinese  and    we    get   wu    ti, — the 
very  terms  employed  in  the  Chinese  account. 

No  bottom,  say  the  Ancidnts. 

No  bottom,  say  the  Moderns. 

The  old  account  puts  the  unfathomable  abyss  in  a  Kuh  (valley  or  ravine) 
and  it  is  within  a  Valley— the  Valley  of  Middle  Park— that  we  actually  find  it. 
Moreover,  this  bottomless  valley  is  "supposed"  (or  reported)  to  belong  to  the 
Ta  Hoh — a  title  which  would  cover  both  Valley  and  Canyon.  Indeed,  Middle 
Park,  with  its  enormous  mountain-walls  connects  directly  with  the  system  of 
the  Grand  Canyon.  Moreover,  the  one  stream  flows  through  both.  And  here 
it  may  be  remarked  that  the  Chu  (or  River  of  Ledges  and  Falls)  is   not  termi- 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


nated  or  swallowed  up  by  the  Bottomless  abyss  in  Kuh  ( or  Valley  of  Middle 
Park.)  It  flows  on  through  the  Ta  Hoh  and  ultimately  enlarges  into  a  Gulf 
(the  Gulf  of  California). 

The  rocky  floor  of  the  Kuh  (or  Valley  of  Middle  Park)  evidently  consti- 
tutes a  support  or  bottom  for  an  impetuous  and  important  River  of  Ledges  or 
rapids  and  yet,  at  the  same  time,  is  reported  to  be  Bottomless.  This  seems 
contradictory.  But  reaching  the  precise  locality  referred  to  in  the  old  account, 
modern  scientists  simply  echo  the  declaration  of  the  Ancients, — that  this  Valley 
or  Kuh,  traversed  by  a  leaping,  furious  Chu,  is  unfathomable. 

Bottomless  I  say  the  Ancients. 

Bottomless !  say  the  Moderns. 

It  thus  appears  that  a  statement  seemingly  calculated  at  first  sight  to  drown 
the  ancient  claim  in  a  flood  of  darision,  turns  out  on  examination  to  be  over- 
whelmingly powerful  evidence  in  support  of  the  validity  of  the  old  record. 

In  no  respect  or  degree  is  the  ancient  testimony  contradicted  or  falsified  by 
modern  evidence.  Take  for  instance  the  old  assertion  that  the  shan  or  moun- 
tain-range of  the  Great  Canyon,  is  "beautiful."  Nothing  seems  more  natural 
than  to  conclude  that  such  a  laudatory  term  is  grossly  out  of  place  and  that  the 
Mountain-range,  with  its  Canyon  and  furious  Chu,  is  a  frightful,  gloomy,  dan- 
gerous, horrible,  repulsive,  bleak,  and  ugly  mass  of  shattered  and  tottering 
heights.  And,  indeed,  there  is  much  truth  in  this  view  of  the  situation.  Nev- 
ertheless, modern  visitors  unite  in  declaring  that  Beauty  is  a  marked  feature  of 
the  rocky  heights  that  possess  or  direct  the  Colorado;  and  this  is  in  agreement 
with  the  ancient  account. 

One  traveler  says:  "The  roar  of  its  waters  was  heard  unceasingly but 

its  walls  and  cHffs,  its  peaks  and  crags,  its  amphitheatres  and  alcoves,  tell  a 
story  of  beauty  and  sublimity"  (note  19). 

Another  visitor,  who  was  treated  most  disrespectfully  by  our  Chu,  has 
eyes  only  for  its  "beauty":  "The  Canyon  grows  more  and  more  picturesque  and 

beautiful  the  farther  we  proceed On  many  of  the  long  stretches    where 

the  river  can  be  seen  for  several  miles,  the  picture  is  one  of  charming  beaut}'. 
....  As  the  clouds  rose  we  were  treated  to  scenes  rare  and  beautiful  in  the 
extreme"  (n.  20.) 

Again:  "Cataract  and  Narrow  Canyons  are  wonderful.  Glen  Canyon  is 
beautiful,  Marble  Canyon  is  mighty;  but  it  is  left  for  the  Grand  Canyon, 
where  the  river  has  cut  its  way  down  through  the  sandstones,  the  marbles,  and 
the  granites  of  the  Kaibab  Mountains,  to  form  those  beautiful  and  awe-inspir- 
ing pictures  that  are  seen  from  the  bottom  of  the  black  granite  gorge,  where 
above  us  rise  great  wondrous  mountains  of  bright  red  sandstone  capped  with 
cathedral  domes  and  spires  of  white,  with  pinnacles  and  turrets,  and  towers,  in 
such  intricate  forms  and  flaming  colors  that  words  fail  to  convey  any  idea  of 
their  beauty  and  sublimity." 

The  translation  informs  us  that  the  mighty  gorge  is  the  Canyon  of  Kiang, 
Shang,  or  Almighty  God. 

And  a  modern  visitor  declares  that  "here  Omnipotence  stands  revealed," 
and  that  here  is  "a  glorious  creation  of  God."  (n.  21.) 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


So  impressed  were  the  ancients  with  the  beauty  and  grandeur  of  this 
region  that  they  peopled  it  with  the  souls  of  illustrious  sages,  and  declared  that 
here  was  the  Canyon  of  Almighty  God.  And  those  who  enter  it  today,  come 
reeling  back  from  its  portals, — declaring  that  no  mortal  can  describe  its  glories, 
and  that  it  is  the  Grand  Canyon  of  Almighty  God  I 

Words  fail  one  in  the  attempt  to  describe  this  glorious  creation  of  God. 
The  impression  it  leaves  upon  the  mind  is  overpowering.  One  feels  as  though 
he  had  been  admitted  into  the  presence  of  the  Genii  of  the  plutonic  regions, 
had  penetrated  to  the  very  heart  of  the  inner  world  of  elemental  creations." 

We  need  not  wonder  that  the  old  account  connects  a  revered  ancestor  with 
this  glorious  and  celestial  retreat  in  the  Grand  Canyon.  He  is  called  Shao 
Hao,  and  is  furthur  termed  a  ju,  (or  sucking  child.) 

Shao  signifies  "little"  or  "a  little,"  and  Hao  is  formed  of  the  signs  for 
"sun"  and  "heaven."  It  is  therefore  evident  that  the  ju  or  infant  at  the  Canyon 
is  (or  was)  a  little  sun-child,  or  child  of  the  sun. 

American  rulers  called  themselves  "Children  of  the  Sun,"  and  we  should 
be  careful  not  to  confound  our  Arizona  Prince  with  any  Asiatic  ruler.  [The 
Hao  or  Shao  Hao  of  supposed  Chinese  origin  is  represented  by  some  different 
symbols:  see  Williams'  diet.  p.  1 72,  columns  I  and  2.] 

The  little  Child  of  the  Sun  at  the  Ta-Hoh  or  Great  Canyon  should  not  be 
-  -must  not  be — confounded  with  any  early  Chmese  sun-worshiper.  We  are  to 
look  far  to  the  east  of  China  for  both  the  Canyon  and  the  little  Child  of  the 
Sun  referred  to  in  the  account  before  us. 

We  are  informed  that  the  country  connected  with  the  Great  Canyon  was 
called  "Shao  Hao's  country"  (or  the  land  of  the  Sun-child )  on  account  of  the 
little  Prince.  He  entered  (chi)  it,  and  this  furnished  the  reason  (or  chih)  for 
its  title — Land  of  the  Sun-child. 

The  infant  (or  ju)  is  distinctly  called  a  ruler  (or  ti.)  Moreover,  although 
he  was  little  (shao)  or  but  a  ju  (suckling);  he  was  a  supreme  king  (or  chwen 
suh).     (Note  22.) 

Chwen  is  formed  by  putting  together  the  two  words  "only"  and  "head." 
And  suh  is  a  Chinese  term  composed  of  the  two  significant  words  "only"  and 
"king"  (see  Williams'  diet.  pp.  117,  825,  1043.) 

Evidently  the  baby  ruler  (or  ju  ti)  was  regarded  by  his  people,  in  this 
region  remarkable  for  its  mountains,  as  the  only  or  supreme  head — the  6hwen 
suh,  as  Chinese  historians  might  forcibly  phrase  it— of  the  people  ruled. 

[Because  the  infant  was  king  and  even  the  supreme  king,  it  seems  reason- 
able to  suppose  that  his  father  was  dead  (and  his  mother  alive)  at  the  time 
when  he  was  carried  into  the  Great  Canyon  and  duly  suckled  there.]  We  need 
not  just  here  attempt  to  unravel  his  history.  Enough  to  show  that  our  Grand 
Canyon  is  positively  and  clearly  referred  to  in  Chinese  literature.  We  may, 
however,  note  the  fact  that  the  royal  infant  (see  translation)  belonged  to  the 
Kin  Tien  or  Golden  Heaven  family,  and  this  title  must  be  considered  when 
the  history  of  our  Arizona  Prince  comes  to  be  investigated.  It  should  further 
be  remarked  that  the  respected  translator  has  erred  slightly  in  his  supposition 
that  the  Chwen  Suh    (or   Supreme    Head)   was    "Shao   Hao's   descendant." 


10         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


The  Chinese  terms  In  the  original  are:  shao  hao  (not  hao's)  ju  (baby)  ti 
(ruler)  chwen  suh  (head  king.)  It  was  the  little  sun  child  ruler  and 
supreme  king  who  was  at  the  Canyon. 

Particular  attention  should  be  paid  to  the  fact,  that,  although  regarded  as 
a  supreme  ruler,  the  Prince  is  represented  as  being  but  a  suckling  (or  ju) 
when  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  Great  Canyon. 

Now,  the  translation  states  that  this  baby  or  supreme  lord  "of  whom  no 
further  description  is  given,  left  there  his  lute  and  lyre.  It  says  that  his  lute 
and  lyre  are  in  this  canyon." 

MUSIC  IN  THE  GRAND  CANYON? 

It  is  absurd  to  imagine  for  a  moment  that  a  sucking  infant  could  own,  or 
could  be  really  supposed  to  own,  a  lute.  The  Chinese  text  does  not  say  that 
the  musical  instrument  is  "his."  And  yet,  curiously  enough,  it  does  declare 
that  the  baby-prince  left  or  abandoned  (k*i)  a  Lute  or  Lyre  in  the  Canyon. 

Why  should  such  a  matter  be  mentioned  ?  Supposing  that  a  fiddle  was 
left  behind,  or  a  drum,  or  a  rattle,  why  should  the  trivial  fact  be  gravely 
recorded  ? 

If  a  Lute  was  left  in  the  mighty  chasm,  its  remains  might  be  there  still. 
But  how  could  an  infant  be  said  to  leave  or  abandon  a  Lute  ?  Would  he  not 
try,  so  well  as  our  memory  serves,  to  first  get -it  into  his  mouth?  Would  not 
his  chubby  hands,  quite  stout  enough  for  destructive  arts,  tear  the  strings 
apart  and  feed  the  music  to  the  nearest  cat  ?  Would  it  be  a  lute  at  all  when 
ultimately  relinquished  ?  And  if  the  babe  derived  pleasure  from  ill-treated 
and  squalling  strings,  why  should  he  leave  the  lute  behind  ?  As  well  say  that 
the  suckling  abandoned  there  a  fishing-rod  !  Would  not  a  milk-bottle  be  a 
much  readier  fount  of  ecstacy  than  either  a  lute  or  a  flute?  Why,  neither  one 
nor  the  other  could  be  heard  within  the  Canyon. 

A  Chinese  commentator,  however,  relieves  us  from  the  necessity  of  seek- 
ing for  a  literal  lute  between  the  resounding  jaws  of  the  mighty  chasm  (note  23.) 
He  says  it  is  erroneous  (ngo)  to  suppose  that  the  baby  emperor  (ju  ti)  grasped 
(ping,)  or  left  behind  (chi)  or  abandoned  in  the  place  of  midnight  darkness 
(huen)  any  lutes  or  lyres  (kin  seh.)  In  hyperboHcal  language  (wu  wu) — 
which  is  never  true  when  taken  literally — a  clear  limpid  river  (shuh)  would 
be  the  lute  (kin.) 

But  how  could  a  clear  stream  serve  as  a  lute  ? 

The  running  water  might  produce  limpid  notes.  Thus  Moore,  in  his  ode 
on  "Harmony,"  uses  the  following  words  : 

"Listen  I — when  the  night-wind  dies 
Down  the  still  current,  like  a  harp  it  sighs ! 
A  liquid  chord  in  every  wave  that  flows." 

Here  is  a  current  of  water  Ukened  to  the  string  of  a  harp,  and  the  playing 
of  winds  compared  to  music. 

Mrs.  Slgourney  calls  Niagara  a  "Trump,"  and  we  accept  the  assertion 
(althou  gh  literally  it  is  quite  untrue.) 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         I ! 


But  if  the  Chinese  account  placed  a  Trump  in  the  Ontario  chasm  there 
would  be  considerable  difficulty  in  finding  it. 

Fortunately,  in  the  case  immediately  before  us,  it  is  a  Chinese  author  who 
tells  us  that  we  are  to  seek  for  limpid  streams  rather  than  for  literal  lutes  or 
lyres. 

The  mention  of  the  latter  would  probably  imply  that  the  sounds  of  some 
stream  or  streams  in  the  Great  Canyon  are  of  a  remarkably  soft  and  musical 
character. 

Streams  may  produce  delightful  tones.  Thus  one  observer  (at  Yellowstone) 
tells  of  the  'mysterious  music  of  the  distant  falls"  "like  the  tremulous  vibration 
of  a  mighty  but  remote  harp-string."  (note  24) 

If  falling  water  under  certain  peculiar  acoustic  circumstances  can  pro- 
duce notes  like  those  struck  off  from  harp-strings.  the  tones  can  also  be  com- 
pared to  those  of  lutes  or  lyres  (for  all  are  stringed  instruments. ) 

The  very  volume  which  places  lutes  and  lyres  in  the  Great  Canyon,  also 
tells  of  a  forest  elsewhere,  which  is  a  "Forest  of  Lutes  and  Lyres"  (note  25.) 

Of  course  sounds  merely  resembling  those  of  the  stringed  instruments,  are 
here  referred  to.  A  forest  is  composed  of  trees  rather  than  musical  instruments, 
but  it  may  produce  musical  tones  like  those  of  Lutes  and  Lyres. 

And  similarly  the  notes  arising  from  the  Grand  Canyon  may  be  of  a  lute- 
like  character.  This  is  the  teaching  of  the  Ancients.  We  have  found  the  Bot- 
tomless stream  and  it  is  certain  that  visitors  should  return  with  accounts  of 
melody  arising  from  the  Canyon.  Future  explorers  should  listen  for  musical 
notes.     They  will  certainly  not  be  disappointed. 

One  visitor  says:  "The  waters  waltz  their  way  through  the  Canyon,  mak- 
ing their  own  rippling,  rushing,  roaring  music.*'  We  further  read  of  innum- 
erable cascades  adding  their  wild  music  to  the  roar  of  the  river." 

What  are  these  innumerable  cascades  but  the  strings  of  the  Lute  which 
was  heard  ages  ago  by  enraptured  ears  and  which  has  kept  on  resounding 
ever  since.  The  concert  in  the  Canyon  drowns  even  the  basic  roar  of  the 
river.     The  music  is  there. 

"We  sit  on  some  overhanging  rocks,  and  enjoy  the  scene  for  a  time,  listen- 
ing to  the  music  of  falling  waters  away  up  the  canyons."  (n.  26.) 

It  appears  that  the  acoustic  properties  of  the  Grand  Canyon  are  calculated 
to  produce  most  notable  effects:  "Great  hollow  domes  are  seen    in    the    eastern 

side  of  the  rock Our  words  are  repeated  with  startling  clearness,  but   in 

a  soft  mellow  tone,  that  transforms  them  into  magical  mu«ic." 

Elsewhere  an  immense  grotto  "was  doubtless  made  for  an  academy  of 
music  by  its  storm  born  architect;  so  we  name  it  Music  Temple."  (n.  27.) 

Lutes  and  Lyres  are  there,  say  the  Ancients. 

A  Temple  of  Music  is  there,  say  the  Moderns. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  the  Chinese  annotater  calls  the  Great  Canyon — the 
Ta  Hoh — a  place  of  fhuen)  midnight  darkness  and  declares  that  it  is  erron- 
eous to  suppose  that  the  Lute  played  down  there  (where  it  could  not  possibly 
be  heard)  was  an  instrument  held  by  a  human  hand  (the  hand  of  a  sucklingi). 


12         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


Now,  although  the  great  gorge  is  wonderfully  beautiful,  it  must  be  conceded 
that  its  basic  part  (within  which  human  beings  might  dwell)  is  decidedly  dark. 
Here  "it  is  necessary  to  'lie  down  upon  one's  back  in  order  to  see  the  sky,' — as 
I  once  heard  General  Crook  express  it.  Into  much  of  this  deep  gorge  no  ray 
of  sunshine  ever  falls,  and  it  well  deserves  the  name  of  the  "Dark  Canyon.'  " 
(n.  28).  Often  in  midday,  stars  are  seen  shining  overhead;  and  it  may  well  be 
called  a  place  of  midnight  darkness  (huen.) 

In  the  following  passage  a  modern  visitor  notices  the  "dark  and  frowning" 
walls  of  the  chasm,  but  still  enlarges  on  their  beauty: — ^"One  would  think  that 
after  traveling  through  six  hundred  miles  of  those  canyons,  one  would  be  satis- 
fied with  beauty  and  grandeur,  but  in  this  fact  lies  the  charm.  Of  the  six 
hundred  miles  no  two  miles  are  alike.  The  picture  is  ever  changing  from 
grandeur  to  beauty,  from  beauty  to  sublimity,  from  the  dark  and  frowning 
greatness  of  its  granite  walls,  to  the  aazzling  colors  of  its  upper  cliffs.  And  I 
stood  in  the  last  few  miles  of  the  Grand  Canyon  spellbound  in  wonder  and 
admiraticn,  as  firmly  as  I  was  fixed  in  the  first  few  miles  in  surprise  and  astonish- 
ment."    (note  29.) 

Nature  has  done  her  best  to  adorn  the  walls  of  the  mighty  gorge.  We  are 
told  of  "thousands  of  rivulets"  that  "dropped  farther  and  farther  down,  till 
the  whole  of  the  bright  scarlet  walls  seemed  hung  with  a  tapcs'ry  of  silver 
threads,  the  border  fringed  with  white  fleecy  clouds  which  hung  to  the  tops  of 
the  walls,  and  through  which  the  points  of  the  upper  cliffs  shone  as  scarlet 
tassels." 

Nor  was  Dame  Nature  completely  satisfied  with  her  tapestry  and  fringe  of 
tassels.  Other  embroidery  was  displayed.  "As  the  sun  broke  through  some 
side  gorge,  the  canyon  was  spanned  from  side  to  side,  as  the  clouds  shifted 
their  position,  with  rainbow  after  rainbow,  vying  to  outdo  in  brilliancy  of  color 
the  w^alls  of  the  canyon  themselves." 

'The  ancient  account  declares,  that  in  "the  Region  beyond  the  Eastern 
Sea,"  a  Bottomless  river  traverses  a  Great  Canyon.  And  this  stream,  remarka- 
ble for  its  ledges  (chu)  or  rapids  and  falls,  rushes  onward  and  downward, 
and  grows  or  enlarges  into  a  Gulf.  And  the  Canyon,  the  River,  and  the  Gulf 
are  all  reported  to  be  Kan— or  Beautiful. 

And  visitors  today  return  from  all  three,  declaring  that  they  are  Beautiful } 
Beautiful!!     Beautiful!!! 

And  some  are  entranced  by  strains  of  muic  arising  from  the  mouth  of  the 
Canyon  and  declare  that  it  holds  an  "orchestra."  In  one  place  the  thousands 
of  streamlets,  glistening  and  gleaming  like  silvery  cords,  stretch  downward  from 
the  edge  of  the  painted  chasm;  and  the  resounding,  melodious  precipice  is  ca  1- 
ed  "the  Cliff  of  the  Harp."  (note  30.)  What  is  this  but  an  echo  of  the  ancient 
declaration  that  the  royal  Lute  in  the  Canyon  was  merely  a  musical  stream. 
Similar  ideas  have  occured  to  poets.  Coleridge  in  his  "Ancient  Mariner,**, 
tells  of  "A  noise  like  of  a  hidden  brook 

In  the  leafy  month  of  June, 
Which  to  the  sleeping  woods  all  night 
Singeth  a  quiet  tune." 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.  13 


And  Moore  has  heard  the  notes  of'harp-strings  sounding  forth  from  melo- 
dious streams.  What  wonder,  then,  that  ancient  poets  (and  the  translation 
states  that  the  particular  work  which  makes  mention  of  the  "Bottomless  Kuh" 
or  valley,  is  a  "poem")  should  have  likened  a  collection  of  falling  streams  or 
cascades  to  the  chords  of  a  tuneful  Lute  and  then,  to  distinguish  it  from  others 
less  excellent,  have  applied  to  the  stringed  instrument  the  name  of  their  Prince. 
Americans  today  gravely  talk  of  visiting  or  seeing  "St.  Luke's  Head"  (in  Cali- 
fornia!) And  we  possess  a  mere  natural  formation  which  is  supposed  to 
resemble  a  nose  and  is  religiously  called  "St.  Anthony's  Nose."  In  truth  this 
"nose"  is  no  more  a  literal  nose  than  the  "Lute"  in  the  Canyon  is  a  literal 
stringed  inst'^ument  made  by  men.  Then  we  have  "Cleopatra's  Bath"  and 
"Pompey's  Pillar."  (Next  tell  us  in  the  interest  of  chaos  and  confusion  that 
Pompey  left  here  "his"  Pillar. 

In  the  grend  caves  at  Pikes  Peak  there  is  an  "organ,"  which  is  really  no 
organ  at  all.  It  is  a  natural  formation  or  production  from  w^hich  charming 
melodies  are  fetched  by  skilled  musicians.  Now  if  we  ourselves  can  gravely 
call  a  musical,  highly-strung  rock  an  "Organ,"  may  not  the  Ancients  be  excused 
for  calling  a  combination  of  musical  streams  a  Lute?  Contemplating  the  "Cliff 
of  the  Harp,"  we  can  readily  understand  how  old-time  visitors  found  down 
there  the  tuneful  string  of  a  "Lute"  and  how  an  imperial  Child  of  the  Sun  was 
unable  to  lug  along  "his"  notable  musical  toy.  There  it  remains  and  melodious 
notes  still  come  floating  up. 

Lutes  and  Lyres  are  there,  say    the  Ancients. 

"An  Academy  of  Music!"  say  the  Moderns. 

The  Chinese  annotater  remarks  that  the  lieh  tsze  (a  class  of  sages  or 
teachers— the  literati)  are  unacquainted  (pu  chi)  with  the  sheu-hai  or  Gulf 
situated  toward  the  east  (chi  tung.) 

The  Chinese  scholars  of  the  writer's  time  knew  little  or  nothing  of  our 
Gulf  of  California  (or  Sheu-hai).  However,  it  was  known  to  some;  and  we 
are  now  informed  that  it  is  ki  (a  few;  nearly  about,  approximately)  yih  (to 
guess,  to  bet;  100,000;  an  indeterminate  number)  wan  (10,000)  le. 

A  single  wan  le  should  measure  about  3,000  miles,  and  a  few  (to  "guess") 
separate  China  from  the  Ta-Hoh  which  connects  with  the  Bottomless  kuh  or 
valley  (**Ta-Hoh  shih  wei  wu  ti  chi  kuh.) 

Evidently  the  Great  Canyon  lies  more  than  one  wan  le  (3,000  miles)  to  the 
east  of  China.  We  find  indeed  that  the  number  may  well  be  referred  to  as  "a 
few"  (ki.) 

Nor  can  the  Gulf  be  more  than  about  30,000  le  to  the  east,  seeing  that 
this  Gulf  of  Cahfornia  is  in  "the  region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea"  along  with  the 
Fu-Tree  which  has  a  trunk  of  300  le.  The  Gulf  to  the  east  is  connected  with 
the  mountain  system  whose  Branches  exhibit  the  gorgeous  spectacle  of  Ten 
Suns.  In  short,  the  Gulf  and  Canyon  are  along  with  Fu-Sang;  and  Fu-Sang 
is 'only  30,000  le  to  the  east  of  China,  and  merely  10,000  wide.  Accordingly, 
the  Gulf  is  but  "a  few"  wan  le  to  the  east  of  the  Flowery  Kingdom. 

To  look  for  the  Canyon  and  Tree  within  the  Philippine  Islands,  contiguous 
to  China,  is  simply  impossible.     The  islands  have    been    pretty    well   thrashed 


14         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


over  lately,  and  no  one  has  met  with  the  Tree  I  It  has  a  "Trunk  of  300  le," 
and  collectors  of  curios  or  strange  plants  should  keep  wide  awake  and  see  that 
they  don't  pass  it  in  the  dark.  And  yet  with  its  Ten  Moons,  how  miss  it  > 
How  fail  to  notice  our  glittering,  gleaming,  glorious  candelabrum  ?  It  couldn't 
have  fallen  or  drifted  over  to  the  Panama  ditch  ?  It  can't  possibly  be  now 
stuck  in  any  South  American  Flower-pot  ?  Catching  the  Tree  seems  to  be  as 
slippery  as  catching  Tartars,  and  perhaps  when  the  first  is  found,  the  others 
won't  be  very  far  off. 

The  Chinese  commentator,  of  course,  never  saw  either  the  Gulf  or  Canyon 
but  he  quotes  from  earlier  writers  who  were  well  acquainted  with  our  "region 
beyond  the  Eastern  Sea;"  and  one  of  these  named  Chwangtsze,  is  quoted  to 
the  effect  that  in  the  Ta  Hoh  or  Great  Canyon  high  winds  (yuen  fung)  occur 
(yu)  or  come  unexpectedly  upon  one. 

Do  storms  arise  suddenly  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  mighty  chasm? 

One  modern  explorer  says:  "I  go  up  to  explore  the  alcove.  While  away  a 
whirlwind  comes  scattering  the  camp  fire  among  the  dead  willows  and  cedar 
spray  and  sooa  there  is  a  conflagration,  the  men  rushing  for  the  boats,  leaving 
all  they  cannot  readily  seize  at  the  moment,  and  even  then  they  have  their 
clothing  burned  and  hair  singed."  (note  31.) 

Storms  occur  in  all  parts  of  the  world.  Is  there  anything  peculiar  about 
the  tempests  which  are  said  to  suddenly  arise  in  the  Great  Canyon> 

One  visitor  says:  "Storms  were  not  infrequent  and  these  occurring  where 
the  canyon  walls  were  a  mile  high  and  close  together  produced  an  effect  that 
was  almost  supernatural  in  its  awfulness.  The  deep  thunder  echoed  sharply 
between  the  cliffs,  producing  a  roaring  sound  that  was  almost  deafening." 
(note  32.) 

It  should  be  remembered  that  the  vast  caverns  here  multiply  the  bellow- 
ings  of  thunder  and  also  help  to  confine  and  intensify  the  raging  and  imprison- 
ed whirlwinds. 

One  eye  or  ear  witness  tells  of  a  storm  both  seen  and  heard  within  the 
Canyon  and  adds:  "I  have  seen  the  lightning  play  and  heard  the  thunder  roll 
among  the  summit  peaks  of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  as  I  have  stood  on  some 
rocky  point  far  above  the  clouds,  but  nowhere  has  the  awful  grandeur 
equalled  that  night  in  the  lonesome  depths  of  what  was  to    us    death's    canyon. 

Again  all  was  shut  in    by    darkness   thicker    than    that   of    Egypt.     The 

stillness  was  only  broken  by  the  roar  of  the  river  as  it  rushed  along  beneath  me. 
Suddenly  as  if  the  mighty  cliffs  were  rolling  down  against  each  other,  there  was 
peal  after  peal  of  thunder  striking  against  the  marble  cliffs  below,  and  mingling 
with  their  echoes,  bounding  from  cliff  to  cliff.  Thunder  with  echo,  echo  with 
thunder,  crossed  and  recrossed  from  wall  to  wall  of  the  canyon,"  etc.  (note  33.) 

Surely  sudden  and  dreadful  storms  rage  here.  The  loudest  in  North 
America,  says  an  expert. ' 

Observe  that  the  visitor  just  quoted  notices  the  "roar  of  the  river"  in  cAi- 
nection  with  the  fury  of  the  tempest. 

Now,  the  ancient  visitor  does  the  same.  After  directing  attention  to  the 
sudden  high  winds,  he  says  that  a  decidedly  curious  sight   or    spectacle    (king 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         15 


shun)  is  the  keang  (a  large  main  stream  which  receives  tributaries)  spreading 
abroad  (fu)  the -noise  of  flowing  water  (tsung)  in  the  Ta-Hoh  or  Great 
Canyon. 

The  noise  of  the  great  river  or  Keang  is  thus  noticed  by  the  ancient 
visitor,  who  also  declares  that  the  Ta-Hoh  or  Great  Canyon  constitutes  a 
decidedly  fine  or  curious  sight. 

And  such  in  truth  it  actually  is.  "Imagine  a  chasm  that  at  times  is  less 
than  a  quarter  of  a  mile  wide  and  more  than  a  mile  deep,  the  bed  of  which   is 

a  tossing,  roaring,  madly  impetuous  flood What  an  imposing  spectacle; 

what  a  sublime  vision  of  mightiness  I"  (n.  34). 

A  great  sight !  say  the  Ancients. 

A  Wonder  of  the  World  !  say  the  Moderns. 

The  roar  of  the  river  has  never  ceased  since  the  ancient  scribe,  or  his 
informant,  passed  that  way.  A  modern  visitor  says :  "The  threatening  roar  of 
the  w^ater  is  loud  and  constant." 

Again,  "The  roar  of  its  waters  was  heard  unceasingly  from  the  hour  we 
entered  it  until  the  time  we  landed  here.     No  quiet  in  all  that  time."  (n.  35). 

One  navigator  tells  of  a  "bore"  in  connection  with  the  resounding  stream. 
"In  the  stillness  of  the  night,  the  roaring   of    the    huge    mass   could    be    heard 

reverberating  among  the  windings  of  the  river This  singular  phenomenon 

of  the  'bore,'  as  it  is  called,  is  met  with  but  at  few  places  in  the  world In 

the  course  of  four  or  five  hours  the  river  falls  about  thirty  feet"  (n.  36.) 

Another  explorer  pauses  at  one  spot  in  his  amphibious  career  to  note  that 
"high  water  mark"  can  be  seen  "fifty,  sixty,  or  a  hundred  feet  above  its  present 
stage;"  and  "when  a  storm  bursts  over  the  canyon,  a  side  gulch  is  dangerous, 
for  a  sudden  flood  may  come  and  the  inpouring  waters  will  raise  the  river,  so 
as  to  hide  the  rocks  before  your  eyes"  (n.  37). 

Another  navigator,  who  never  was  without  a  life-belt, — which  he  found  of 
vital  use  when  righting  his  too  often  overturned  ark, — tells  with  amazement  of 
"the  waves,  torrents,  and  cataracts  of  this  wildest  of  rivers.'' 

A  ceaseless  basic  roar  is  there, — deadened  at  times  by  floods  of  music,  yet 
nevertheless  eternally  there. 

The  sea  connected  with  the  Great  Canyon  is  elsewhere  called  a  Puh  hai 
(the  latter  term  signifying  "sea." ) 

A  Puh  hai  is  said  to  be  a  "Gulf,"  and  we  find  a  Gulf— the  Gulf  of  Califor- 
nia— at  the  mouth  of  the  Colorado. 

It  should,  however,  be  observed  that  the  term  Puh  by  itself  stands  for  "an 
arm  of  the  sea."  A  Puh  hai  is  a  Gulf  which  forms  "an  arm  of  the  sea."  The 
Gulf  or  sea  should  be  shaped  like  an  arm — an  arm  of  the  ocean  (see  Williams' 
diet.  p.  718.) 

Now,  a  glance  at  the  map  shows  that  in  a  very  peculiar  sense  the  Gulf  of 
California  is  a  hai  or  "sea"  which  meets  the  requirements  of  being  shaped 
like  an  arm.  It  is  a  sea  and  a  gulf  and  at  the  same  time  "an  arm"  of  the 
ocean.     Truly  it  is  a  Puh  hai. 

A  great  many  "gulfs"  are  quite  unlike  "arms,"  being  too    broad    to   admit 


!6    ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


of  such  a  comparison.  But  our  Gulf  of  California  is  comparatively  narrow  and 
is  truly  an  "arm"  of  the  sea.  And  notice  how  the  water  of  the  river — our 
Colorado — "accumulates  and  so  forms  a  gulf."  Such  are  the  words  of  the 
existing  translation  and  they  apply  completely  to  the  American  situation.  Here 
we  find  the  water  of  the  Colorado  accumulating  or  widening  out  until  it 
becomes  a  great  body  of  water — a  Gulf.  Indeed  this  development  or  process 
of  expansion  is  so  gradual  that  it  is  impossible  for  navigators  to  tell  where  the 
river  ends  or  the  gulf  begins. 

In  the  Chinese  comment  immediately  before  tis,  however,  the  hai  or  sea  to 
the  Canyon's  river  mouth  is  called  a  Sheu. 

Now  this  term  signifies  "to  rinse  the  mouth,  to  scour;  to  wash  out  a  thing; 
to  purify."     (Williams,  p.  757.) 

The  word  Sheu  is  written  by  combining  the  characters  for  "water"  and 
"to  suck  in." 

It  is  evident  that  our  Gulf  of  California  is  "an  arm  of  the  sea"  and  no  less  a 
Sheu.  A  "mouth"  it  undoubtedly  has,  and  this  mouth  is  being  ceaselessly 
"washed,"  "scoured,"  and  "purified."  Even  a  dentist  would  be  satisfied! 
The  immense  stream  rushes  out,  and  tides  from  the  Pacific  rush  in.  Moreover 
the  Colorado  "sucks  in"  the  tidal  wave  known  as  the  Bore.  Surely  w^e  have 
here  the  Eastern  Gulf  sea  which  is  both  a  Puh  and  a  Sheu. 

The  water  of  the  noisy,  restless,  purifying  stream  within  the  Ta-Hoh  was 
it  is  said, — 

1.  Yu  (which  means  "used  or  employed.") 

2.  Wuh  (to  w^ter  or  irrigate;  to  soften  with  water;  to  enrich,) 

3.  Tsiao  (scorched,  burned,  singed,  dried  up.) 

4.  Chi  (referring  to  or  denoting.) 

5.  Tsze  (here  or  this.) 

Evidently  the  water  of  the  Colorado  was  used  to  irrigate  some  ground  or 
vegetation  which  was  dried  up  or  scorched . 

Such  a  remark  implies  a  high  temperature  (during  the  period  of  growth) 
between  the  walls  of  the  chasm,  and  also  leads  us  to  look  for  some  soil— some 
scorched  or  dried  up  soil  (sadly  in  need  of  irrigation) — between  the  jaws  of  the 
Canyon.     Is  there  parched  or  desert  soil  on  the  banks  of  the  Colorado? 

Here  is  the  answer:  "The  region  through  which  the  chafing  waters  of  the 
Colorado  run  is  forbidding  in  the  extreme,  a  vast  Sahara  of  waste  and  in- 
utility; a  desert  too  dreary  for  either  vegetable   or    animal    life;    a    land    that    is 

haunted  with  wind-storm,  on  which  ride    the    furies   of    desolation 

The  earth    is   parched    to    sterility It    is   like   the   moon,    a   parched 

district,  save  for  the  single  stream  which,  instead  of  supplying  sustenance,  is 
eating  its  vitals."  (note  38.) 

Another  traveler  visited  Fort  Yuma,  on  the  Colorado,  and  says:  "The  ride 

to  the  fort  was  through    a    flat   and    desolate    looking    country It    was    a 

dreary  eight  hours  ride.''  Other  remarks  are  made  concerning  "the  barren- 
ness of  the  surrounding  region  and"  "the  intense  heat  of  its  summer 
climate."  (note  39.) 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         17 


In  some  spots,  hovrever,  water  produces  magical  effects.  In  the  Mojave 
valley,  for  instanqe,  "the  annual  overflow  of  the  river  enables  the  Mojaves,  "to 
raise  with  little  labor,  an  abundant  supply  of  provisions  for  the  year Dur- 
ing one  season,  a  few  years  since,  the  Colorado  did  not  overflow  its  banks;  there 
were  consequently  no  crops  and  great  numbers  of  the  Mojaves  perished  from, 
starvation."     (note  40.) 

Curiously  enough,  although  rain  fell  furiously  within  the  Canyon,  it  was 
observed  by  a  traveler  that  "such  rain-storms  were  invariably  confined  to  the 
immediate  vicinity  of  the  Canyon,  the  territory  lying  two  or  three  miles  east  or 
west  continuing  parched  with  hardly  a  cloud  above  it."  And  the  explorer 
wonders  how  some  ancient  inhabitants,  whose  buildings  are  now  in  ruins," 
managed  to  exist,  situated  as  they  were  in  a  desolate  country,  where  there  was 
great  scarcity  of  both  vegetable  and  animal  life." 

The  ancient  Chinese  account  connects  a  baby  king,  a  supreme  ruler,  with 
the  Great  Canyon  and  now  states  that  water  was  used  within  the  gorge  to 
irrigate  the  soil,  which  is  represented  as  being  dried  up  or  schorched.  Is 
the  Canyon  remarkable  for  its  heat?     Surely  it  ought  to  be  cool  down  there? 

One  visitor  says:  "That  Canyon  was  the  sultriest  place  I  have  ever  struck, 
and  my  experience  includes  some  of  the  hottest  sections  this  side  of  the 
equator. 

The  oppressive  heat  in  the  chasm  was  felt  at  a  "point  fifty  times  as  deep 
as  the  great  chasm  at  Niagara."   (note  41.) 

"But  despite  the  terrible  heat,  despite  the  discomfort  of  the  situation,  I  was 
compelled  to  wonder  and  admire.  For," — 

The  Ta-Hoh  should  constitute  a  magnificent  sight,  but  it  is  also  said  to 
contain  some  scorched  or  dried  up  soil.     Is  such  to  be  seen? 

An  explorer  reached  the  Colorado  at  a  point  where  it  is  266  yards  wide, 
and  adds  that  the  "soil"  "bore  nothing  but  dry  weeds  and  bushes  and  the 
whole  scene  presented  the  most  perfect  picture  of  desolation  I  have  ever 
beheld,  as  if  some  sirocco  had  passed  over  the  land,  withering  and  scorch- 
ing everything."  (note  42.) 

Withered  and  scorchedl  say  the  Ancients. 

Withered  and  scorchedl  say  the  Moderns. 

In  one  favored  spot,  "to  the  limit  of  vision,  the  tortuous  course  of  the  river 
(the  Colorado)  could  be  traced  through  a  belt  of  alluvial  land  varying  from 
one  to  six  miles  in  width,  and  garnished  with  inviting  meadows,  with  broad 
groves  of  willow  and  mezquite  and  promising  fields  of  grain."  The  visitor 
remarks  that  the  valley  appears  most  attractive  in  the  spring  -"at  this  season  of 
the  year  before  the  burning  heat  has  withered  the  freshness  and  beauty  of 
the  early  vegetation."  (note  43.) 

We  are  informed  that  the  valley  south  of  the  Bend  of  the  Colorado  near 
the  "Needles,"  there  is  in  the  spring  «  "most  brilliant  array"  of  flowers;  but, 
"after  the  ephemeral  influence  of  the  few  spring  showers  has  passed,  the 
annual  plants  are  soon  burned  up  by  the  sun's  heat  and  perfect  sterility  pre- 
vails throughout  the  remainder  of  the  season."   (note  44.) 

It  is  sufficiently  apparent  that  the  soil  when  properly  watered  can  produce 


18         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


abundant  vegetation  and  sufficient  nourishment  for,  of  course,  limited  numbers 
of  human  beings.  Deprived  of  water,  the  soil  is  unable  to  sustain  desirable 
plants,  and  presents  a  sterile  aspect.  Surveying  its  present  condition  or  appear- 
ance  of  barrenness,  a  modern  visitor  wonders  how  the  ancient  inhabitants  con- 
trived to  exist,  or  find  food,  within  the  withered,  unfruitful  chasm.  But  one  of 
the  ancients,  Mr.  Chwang  Tsze,  writing  about  this  very  Ta-Hoh  or  Great 
Chasm,  says  that  they  used  water  to  irrigate  the  otherwise  scorched  or  dried  up 
soil.  Then,  if  such  a  somewhat  belated  answer  is  true,  the  question  arises, 
where  are  the  proofs  ? 

A  chief  of  the  Ethnological  Bureau  very  properly  furnishes  the  answer. 
Standing  in  the  abyss  of  the  Ta-Hoh,  on  the  bank  of  the  roaring  river,  he 
beholds  some  ancient  buildings  and  perceives  how  their  vanished  occupants 
formerly  contrived  to  subsist.  He  says:  "We  can  see  where  the  ancient  people 
who  lived  here — a  race  more  highly  civilized  than  the  present — had  made  a 
garden,  and  used  a  great  spring"  [or  feeder  of  the  Colorado],  "that  comes  out 
of  the  rocks  for  irrigation,**  etc.  (n.  45.) 

We  irrigated  the  soil,  say  the  Ancients. 

They  irrigated  the  soil,  say  the  Moderns. 

Next  comes  the  statement  of  some  trusted  early  sage  or  scholar  who  was 
certainly  acquainted  with  our  Ta-Hoh  ( containing  the  ruin  and  irrigated  soil 
just  noticed.)     It  is  an  observer  or  scribe  named  Tu-tsan,  who  says: — 

10.  Seay  (to  paint,  to  draw,  to  sketch.) 

1 1 .  yih  (to  spread  abroad,  to  diffuse.) 

12i     tung  (a  gorge,  ravine,  canyon,  a  cave,  a  grotto.) 

13.  hueh  ("a  hole  in  the  earth  or  side  of  a  hill,— they  are  used  for  dwell- 
ings;" a  den,  a  grotto,  a  cavern.) 

Something  called  seay  is  here  said  to  be  spread  abroad,  or  diffused  over 
rocky  walls  or  caves.  Williams  (p.  7%)  says  that  seay  (or  &ie  as  it  is  also 
spelled)  stands  for  a  sketch  or  design,  and  adds  that  it  means  to  draw,  to  com- 
pose, to  write.  Morrison,  in  his  dictionary,  says  that  seay  signifies  "to  paint," 
etc. 

Of  course  there  is  no  use  looking  for  anything  so  absurd  as  pictured  or 
painted  rocky  walls  or  caves;  and  we  accordingly  feel  disappointed  when  the 
ancient  text  seems  to  notice  such.  The  pictures  or  paint  should  be  "spread 
abroad"  freely  or  lavishly  in  the  vicinity  of  caverns,  and  we  know  positively 
that  no  "paint"  or  pigment  of  human  composition  can  be  seen  on  the  canyon 
walls.  No  artificial  pictures  are  there,  and  we  are  compelled  to  admit  that  the 
ancient  account  here  stands  falsified. 

We  have,  however,  found  the  caves.  Music  Temple,  for  instance  meas- 
ures two  hundred  feet  from  floor  to  roof,  and  is  "a  vast  chamber  carved  out  of 
the  rock."  There  are  caverns  in  all  directions.  And  the  noisy,  roaring  river  is 
certainly  there  as  well.  One  explorer  says:  "Imagine  a  chasm  that  at  times  is 
less  than  a  quarter  of  a  mile  wide  and  more  than  a  mile  deep,  the  bed  of 
which  is  a  tossing,  roaring,  madly  impetuous  flood,  winding  its  way  in  a  sinuous 
course  along  walls  that  are  painted  with  all  the  pigments  known  to  nature. 
What  an  imposing  spectacle!"  (n.  46.) 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         19 


Of  course  we  must  object  that  the  "walls"  are  really  not  walls  and  that  the 
"paint'*  so  lavishly  spread  upon  them  is  not  paint  at  all.  The  ancient  assertion 
is  delusive,  but  equally  so  is  the  modern.     Just  compare  them. 

The  Virgin  River  enters  the  Colorado,  and  at  the  place  of  junction  are  the 
"resplendently  painted  temples  and  towers  of  the  Virgin,  Here  the  slopes, 
the  serpentine  ledges,  and  the  bosses  of  projecting  rock,  interlarded  with  scanty 
soil,  display  all  the  colors  of  the  rainbow,  and  in  the  distance  may  be  likened 
to  the  painter's  pallete.  The  bolder  tints  are  of  maroon,  purple,  chocolate, 
magenta,  and  lavendar,  with  broad  bands  of  white  laid  in  horizontal  belts. 
(n.47.)  •  ..        . 

Is  this  so-called  "paint"  lavishly  "spread  abroad"? 

Certainly;  one  section  of  the  mighty  and  wondrous  gorge  is  known  as  "the 
painted  canyon." 

Of  course  the  chasm  is  not  really  "painted"  by  artists  or  human  agents, 
and  we  need  not  look  for  painted  cliffs  anywhere.  Nevertheless  modern  ob- 
servers echo  the  language  of  the  ancients,  and  we  are  told  today  of  "the 
painting  of  the  rocks"  and  of  "deep,  painted  alcoves"  and  "painted 
grottos"  (n.  48.) 

The  term  yih  (see  Williams*  diet.  pp.  781,  1092)  is  composed  of  the  char- 
acters for  "fluid**  ana  "vessel,**  and  signifies  "A  vessel  full  to  the  brim;  ready  to 
overflow,  to  run  over;  abundant;  to  spread  abroad,  to  diffuse."  As  seay,  the 
word  which  precedes  yih  in  our  Chinese  note,  signifies  "to  paint,"  we  perceive 
how  the  additional  term  yih  teaches  that  the  paint  made  use  of  has  been 
applied  to  extensive  surfaces,  so  that  it  presents  the  appearance  of  havings 
"overflowed"  or  "run  over"  the  rocky  walls  and  caverns  dealt  with. 

Of  course  neither  writing  nor  literal  pictures  could  overflow  or  drench— 
and  adhere  to— walls  or  cliffs.  But  seay  yih  might  cover  the  motion  of  apply, 
ing  paint  in  a  most  lavish,  copious,  overflowing  manner.  Here  are  cliffs  so 
"rich  with  parti-coloring  as  to  justify  the  most  extravagant  language  in  describ- 
ing them." 

It  looks  as  though  the  gnomes  on  the  job,  in  the  Canyon,  just  emptied  their 
paint-pots  down  dizzy  cliffs  and  then  went  back  for  more.  And  such  extrava- 
gance is  in  harmony  with  the  symbols  which  stand  for  painting  and  vessels  and 
spreading  abroad  or  overflowing  I  Mineral  paints  were  freely  used  and  some- 
times apparently  with  considerab'e  a  X2  and  skill.  Thus  we  read  of  a  red 
sandstone  cliff  "unbroken  by  cracks  or  crevices  or  ledges"  exhibiting  "exten- 
sive flat  surfaces  beautifully  stained  by  iron,  till  one  could  imagine  all  manner 
of  tapestry  effects." 

Here  are  painted  imitations  of  tapestry. 

It  should  further  be  remembered  that  there  are  actual  picture  writings 
spread  abroad  on  extensive  painted  or  stained  surfaces.  The  author  just 
quoted  beheld  ancient  dwellings  which  "exhibited  considerable  skill  on  the  part 
of  the  builders,  the  corners  being  plumb  and  square.  And  just  here  "there 
were  also  numerous  picture  writings.'*   ( note  49. ) 

An  amazed  visitor  exclaims:  "Grand,  glorious,  sublime,  are  the  Pictorial 
cliffs  of  Vermillion  hue!*' 


20         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


"Pictorial"  answers  to  seay  (the  10th  character  in  our  list.) 
Pictured  and  paintedl  say  the  Ancients. 
Pictured  and  painted!  say  the  Moderns. 

We  have  seen  that  our  Gulf  (of  California)  has  been  called  a  Puh-hai,  or 
"arm  of  the  sea." 

Professor  Hoith,  the  celebrated  student  of  Chinese,  in  his  work  On 
"Chinese  History*'  (p.  49,  footnote)  says  that  a  puh  hai  is  "an  estuary." 

Webster  says  that  an  "estuary"  is  "an  arm  of  the  sea;  a  firth;  a  narrow 
passage,  or  the  mouth  of  a  river  or  lake,  where  the  tide  meets  the  current,  or 
flows  and  ebbs." 

Plainly  our  Gulf  of  California  is  a  Puh  hai  or  Estuary. 

It  may  further  be  remarked  that  Puh  is  written  in  Chinese  by  putting 
together  two  characters,  one  standing  for  "water,"  and  the  other  signifying 
"Suddenly;  hastily;  flurried,  disconcerted,  as  when  caught  doing  wrong;  to 
change  color,  confused"  (Williams'  diet.  p.  718.) 

It  is  superfluous  to  say  that  our  Gulf  or  Estuary  is  a  very  "confused"  or 
"flurried"  body  of  water.     It  is  truly  a  Puh-hai. 

Moreover,  it  "changes  color."  As  though  "caught  doing  wrong,"  it 
changes  color  and  blushes  at  times  a  rosy  red.  This  is  the  hue  of  multidunious 
veins:  "A  thousand  streams  rolling  down  the  cliffs  on  every  side,  carry  with 
them  red  sand;  and  these  all  unite  in  the  canyon  below,  in  one  great  stream  of 
red  mud"  (n.  50.)  But  sometimes  the  color  below  Yuma  is  yellow  or  black 
(n.51.) 

The  name  "Colorado"  is  a  Spanish  term  conveying  the  idea  of  redness, 
and  undoubtedly  this  hue  predominates  throughout  the  course  of  the  boisterous 
stream;  but  other  colors  Aue  to  the  dye  or  wash  of  variously  painted  cliffs,  are 
also  met  with.  Moreover  a  section  may  exhibit  one  color  to-day  and  something 
different  to-morrow.  And  so  it  is  with  the  gulf,  which  receives  the  Colorado, 
and  on  which  floating  patches  of  color  are  frequently  seen.  Truly  our  Gulf  or 
Estuary  is  remarkable  for  both  its  coloring,  blue,  red,  etc.,  and  its  changes  of 
color.    In  all  respects  it  is  plainly  a  Puh-hai. 

Our  Gulf  or  Estuary  is  also  called  a  yuen.  Farther  on  (see  Chinese  ver- 
•ion)  we  read  that  the  Canyon  river  produces  or  grows  into  (shang)  a  beauti" 
ful  (kan)  yuen. 

This  term  yuen  stands  for  a  "gulf,  an  abyss;  an  eddy,  a  whirlpool  or  place 
where  the  back  water  seems  to  stop." 

A  whirling,  violent,  or  impetuous  body  of  water  is  evidently  referred  to. 
Fernando  Alarchon,  in  1 540,  found  the  Colorado  "a  very  mighty  river,  which 
ran  with  so  great  a  fury  of  stream  that  we  could  hardly  sail  against  it. 

One  voyager  tells  how  his  ark,  the  "Emma"  was  "caught  in  a  whirlpool, 
and  set  spinning  about."     Here  is  a  yuen. 

Again,  "The  men  in  the  boats  above  see  our  trouble  but  they  are  caught 
in  whirlpools,  and  are  spinning  about  in  eddies." 

What  have  we  here  but  Yuen — multipUed  whirlpools? 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         21 


Through  "Whirlpool  Canyon"  and  all  the  way  to  the  Gulf,  the  waters  dance 
around  and  about.  We  read  of  "dancing  eddies  or  whirlpools."  There  are 
more  than  600  rapids  and  falls  in  the  Colorado  (n.  52.) 

The  waters  waltz  their  way  and  even  furnish  their  own  rippling,  rushing, 
roaring  music."  And  we  are  in  addition  told  of  "innumerable  cascades  adding 
their  w^ild  music"  (n.  53). 

Surely  the  entire  inlet  traversed  by  the  bore  or  reached  by  ocean  tides  is 
in  precisely  the  condition  of  commotion  which  may  well  be  designated  by  the 
term  yuen. 


We  are  informed  that  the  kan  (or  beautiful)  yuen  approaches  (tsih) 
with  vapor  (hi  hwo)  and  bathes  (yuh)  the  sun's  place  (ji  chi  su). 

It  is  evident  that  the  mighty  stream  which  traverses  the  Great  Canyon  in 
the  region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea,  should  flow  from  a  Bottomless  valley  to  a 
Gulf,  and  reach  to  the  Sun's  Place.  And  we  find  that  the  current  of  the  Colo- 
rado extends  to  the  Tropical  line  of  Cancer,  which  crosses  and  marks  the 
mouth  of  the  Gulf  of  California. 


Vapor  or  fog  is  noticed  in  connection  with  the  beautiful  (even  if  restless  or 
reeling)  Yuen. 

Are  fogs  a  noticeable  feature  along  the  coast  of  California  ?  If  so,  they 
might  hide  the  entrance  or  mouth  of  the  Gulf. 

One  visitor  says:  "Westward  toward  the  setting  sun  and  the  sea,"  was  a 
"filmy  fog  creeping  landward,  swallowing  one  by  one  the  distant  hills." 

Again,  we  read  of  "hilltops  that  thrust  their  heads  through  the  slowly  van. 
ishing  vapor." 

Here  "you  may  bask  in  the  sunshine  of  gardens  of  almost  tropic  luxuriance 
or  shudder  in  fogs  that  shroud  the  coast"  (n.  54.) 

We  need  not  wonder  that  such  vapors  should  appear  within  the  confines 
of  the  charming  Gulf  of  California  and  at  times  veil  its  shores.  A  recent  visi- 
tor says:  "The  island  and  mountain  peaks,  whose  outlines  are  seen  from  the 
Gulf,  had  been  somewhat  dimmed  by  a  light  haze,  appeared  surprisingly 
near  and  distinct  in  the  limpid  medium  through  which  they  were  now  viewed. 
The  whole  panorama  became  invested  with  new  attractions,  and  it  would  ht 
hard  to  say  whether  the  dazzling  radiance  of  the  day  or  the  sparkling  clearness 
of  the  night  was  the  more  beautiful  and  brilliant"  (n.  55). 

Hazy  and  Beautiful,  say  the  Ancients. 

Hazy  and  Beautiful,  say  the  Moderns. 

The  haze  is  not  dense  enough  t6  blind  our  eyes  to  the  manifest  fact  that 
those  people  of  old  who  were  acquainted  with  the  position  of  our  Gulf  of  Cali<- 
fornia,  must  also  have  been  acquainted  with  Mexico  and  its  inhabitants. 

Tropical  America  was  considered  by  its  people  to  be  particularly  under 
the  influence  of  the  Sun.  Uxmal  was  in  "the  Land  of  the  Sun"  (n.  56),  and  the 
Mexicans  called  themselves  "Children  of  the  Sun." 


22         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


CAVE  DWELLINGS  IN  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  the  13th  term  in  our  list  is  hueh,  which  stands  for 
cave  habitation.     Are  such  to  be  seen  in  our  Canyon? 

Numerous  tung  (see  12th  term,)  in  the  shape  of  caves  or  holes  are  un- 
doubtedly there,  but  in  addition  the  old  account  notices  hueh.  Have  such  been 
found? 

One  explorer  says :  "Even  more  remarkable  than  the  stupendous  walls 
which  confine  the  Colorado  river,  are  the  ruined  cave  habitations  which  are  to 
be  seen  along  the  lofty  and  inaccessible  ledges,  in  which  a  vanished  race    long 

years  ago  evidently  sought  refuge  from  their  enemies They  were  reached 

by  very  narrow,  precipitous,  and  devious  paths,  and  being  extremely  difficult  to 
attain  by  the  occupants  themselves,  presented  an  impregnable  front  to  invaders" 
(n.  57.) 

Explorers  decending  into  the  ta-hoh  come  forth  to-day  with  accounts  of 
gardens  and  irrigating  streams,  pictured  cliffs,  and  cave  dwellings, — in  com- 
plete agreement  with  the  ancient  record. 

Following  the  term  hueh  we  find  a  14th,  called  han,  which  stands  for  dry, 
heated  air;  to  dry;  parched  as  by  drought;  crisp. 

Is  there  han,  or  dry  heated  air  down  in  the  Canyon? 

One  visitor  entered  the  Grand  Canyon  "in  the  morning  while  darkness  yet 
covered  the  scene,  but  even  then  it  was  oppressively  hot,  and  as  the  sun  got 
higher  I  felt  as  though  I  had  been  thrust    into   a  dutch   oven    and    the    mouth 

stopped  up But,  despite  the  terrible  heat  ....  I  was  compelled  to  wonder 

and  admire  ....  the  gorgeous  cliffs  and  rock  walls  showing  all  those  varied 
colorings,"  etc.  (n.  58). 

It  was  the  "terrible  heat"  which  compelled  the  Ancients  to  resort  to  irriga- 
tion  in  order  to  raise  some  food  for  themselves  and  little  ones.  Destitute  of 
water,  the  soil  is  scorched  and  barren. 

It  is  said  that  "there  are  about  700  square  miles  of  arable  land  between  the 
mouth  of  the  Gila  and  the  35th  parallel  of  N.  latitude,"  along  the  Colorado. 
And  "in  the  valley"  of  this  stream,  where  it  is  joinea  by  the  Gila,  "are  traces 
of  ancient  irrigating  canals,  which  show  that  it  has  once  been  cultivated."  And 
along  the  connected  Gila  are  irrigating  works  of  remarkable  construction  and 
undoubted  antiquity  —antedating  the  arrival  of  the  Spaniards  by  centuries. 

Where  the  soil  is  actualy  irrigated  or  cultivated  the  response  of  nature  is 
most  gratifying  and  encouraging.  We  learn  with  regard  to  the  Colorado  valley, 
that  "portions  are  cultivated  by  the  numerous  tribes  of  Indians  who  live  along 
its  banks,  affording  them  an  abundance  of  wheat,  maize,  beans,  melons, 
squashes,"  etc.  (n.  59). 

Such  ground  would  be  well  worthy  of  attention;  but  the  attitude  of  "the 
numerous  tribes  of  Indians"  along  the  Colorado  might  interfere  with  the  plans 
of  newcomers  and  even  compel  the  latter  to  live  in  caves  or  on  ledges  easily 
defended.  And  it  is  certain  that  soil  insufficiently  watered  presents  a  distress- 
ingly sterile  aspect  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  Colorado. 

One  traveler,  already  quoted,  says  with  regard  to  a  wide  section,   that    "the 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         23 


whole  scene  presented  the  most  perfect  picture  of  desolation  I  have  ever  be- 
held, as  if  some  3ii'occo  had  passed  over  the  land,  withering  and  scorching 
everything  to  crispness*'  (n.  60.) 

Notice  this  word  "crispness"  used  by  our  author.  Turned  into  Chinese  it 
becomes  han  (crisp)- the  very  term  applied  in  the  ancient  record  to  the  con- 
dition of  the  soil  unwatered  within  the  Canyon.  It  is  curious  how  the  old  and 
new  visitors  agree  in  their  descriptions  of  the  interior  of  the  mighty  gorge» 
where  vegetation  is  withered  or  dead. 

Scorched  and  Crisp  I  say  the  Ancients. 

Scorched  and  Crisp  I  say  the  Moderns. 

The  Canyon  should  be  hot,  and  one  of  our  own  visitors  says :  "The  sun 
shone  directly  up  the  Canyon,  and  the  glare  reflected  from  the  walU  made 
the  heat  intolerable  (n.  61.) 

The  word  han  has,  unfortunately  enough,  a  perfect  right  to  appear  in  the 
old  record.     Following  it  we  find  additional  terms : 

15.  A  compound  character  consisting  of  the  signs  for  "Sun"  (Jih)  and 
"People"  (Min.) 

16.  lung  ("used  for  nagas  or  snake  gods;"  "a  dragon,"  •'imperial."  "It  is 
often  used  for  a  man.") 

1 7.  chuh  ("the  illumination  of  torches;  a  candle;  a  light;  to  give  or  shed 
light  upon,  to  illumine") 

The  statement  seems  to  teach  that  the  Sun  People-  the  men — were  using 
torches  to  illumine  the  depth  of  the  hot  Canyon. 

We  have  already  been  informed  that  a  jv  or  suckling,  who  was  yet  a 
supreme  King  (like  perhaps  the  last  Chinese  Emperor  of  the  Manchu  dynasty, 
in  1912  A.  D.)  and  a  Child  of  the  Sun,  was  down  in  the  abyss,  so  we  are  pre- 
pared to  hear  that  his  subjects— some  Sun  people— were  down  there  too. 

Of  course,  for  the  greater  part  of  the  twenty-four  hours,  the  darkness, 
particularly  in  the  cave  dwellings  should  be  most  intense.  One  visitor,  quoted 
already,  tells  of  "darkness  thicker  than  that  of  Egypt."  Such  gloom  should  be 
particularly  and  painfully  felt  by  "Sun  People,"  and  we  are  not  surprised  to 
find  that  they  m{.de  use  of  torches  or  artifical  lights.  Singularly  enough,  the 
chasm,  as  though  remorsefully  conscious  of  the  blackness  of  its  character,  pro- 
duces no  end  of  dried-up  vegetable  stems  or  stalks  fit  to  be  ignited  and  used 
as  firebrands.  These  it  places  convenient  to  your  hand,  as  though  to  invite 
inspection. 

Indians  today  are  in  the  habit  of  using  such  torches.  We  are  informed 
that  "the  custom  still  prevails  among  them  of  carrying  a  firebrand,"  which  was 
noticed  by  Spanish  explorers  in  the  16th  Century,  "and  induced  those  discov- 
erers to  give  to  the  river  the  name  of  Rio  del  Tizon"  (n.  62). 

It  will  be  noticed  that  the  ancient  Chinese  account  connects  lights,  or  "an 
illumination  of  Torches''  (chuh\  with  the  very  stream  which  the  Spaniards  of 
a  later  age,  and  of  their  own  accord  christened  the  Rio  del  Tizon. 

A  Torch-lighted  stream,  say  the  Chinese. 

A  Torch-lighted  stream,  say  the  Spaniards. 


24         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


The  author  or  explorer  last  quoted  says  with  reference  to  Indians  dwelling 
on  the  banks  of  the  Colorado,  that  "the  custom  still  prevails  among  them  of 
carrying  a  firebrand  in  the  hand  in  cold  weather,"  which  was  noticed  by  the 
Spaniards. 

Of  course  the  flaming  brands  may  well  be  used  in  winter  to  warm  those 
who  hold  them,  but  the  Ancients  who  inhabited  the  cave  or  cliff  houses 
(which  they  built  and  which  are  now  more  or  less  in  ruin,  according  to  expos- 
ure or  original  inherent  strength)  might  have  used  the  chuh  or  torches  as 
lights.  These  torches  are  mentioned  in  connection  with  excessive  heat,  and 
it  would  be  absurd  to  suppose  that  the  Sun  People  of  old  desired  a  still  higher 
temperature.  But  mention  is  made  of  cave  dwellings,  and  such  are  actually 
there;  and  we  can  readily  understand  why  the  ancient  dwellers  in  the  cave 
houses  should  have  frequently  used  the  ready -to-hand  torches  when  climbing 
t  J  their  dark  and  break-neck  abodes. 

Even  today  the  chuh  or  torches  are  used  as  lights.  The  withered 
stalks  or  stems,  so  abundant  in  the  Canyon,  are  a  melancholy  illustration  of  the 
scorching  power  of  the  sun  within  the  chasm.  We  have  not  forgotten  the  fact 
that  the  Chinese  term  han  is  used  in  the  ancient  text  and  that  it  stands  for  the 
"crispness"  of  scorched  or  dried  up  plants.  An  actul  visit  to  the  Ta-Hoh  or 
Great  Canyon  referred  to,  shows  that  it  is  this  han— or  withered,  scorched  and 
crisp — vegetation  which  provides  no  end  of  torches  (chuh)  for  dwellers  in  the 
vicinity.  One  stumbling  visitor  uses  the  following  language:  "We  struck  for 
it  .  .  .  through  the  thick  night,  the  guide  occasionally  lighting  a  torch  of  grass" 
(n.  63).  Unable  to  directly  or  steadily  illumine  the  angles  or  recesses  of  the 
Canyon,  the  bright  and  clear-headed  sun  does  the  next  best  thing  and  raises  a 
bounteous  harvest  of  firebrands.  Nature  here  concentrates  her  attention  on  the 
task  of  serving  the  necks  (rather  than  the  bellies)  of  her  children,  and  presents 
them  with  a  crop  of  seasoned  and  brilliant  torches.  Certain  it  is  that  most 
efficient  firebrands  are  raised  here  in  profusion  and  constitute  such  a  unique 
feature  of  the  stream  that  in  order  to  distinguish  it  from  others  in  the  region, 
the  Spaniards  called  our  river  the  Rio  del  Tizon.  Torches  have  lighted  the 
Canyon  in  the  past  and  they  now  throw  light  on  the  ancient  record. 

Mentioned  in  connection  with  withered  vegetation  and  intense  heat,  the 
natural  inference  is  that  the  torches  were  used  to  light  the  steps  of  dwellers  in 
the  Canyon.  Of  course  they  might  in  winter  have  been  used,  like  other  vege- 
table produce,  as  fuel,  but  the  old  record  now  before  us  does  actually  connect 
the  chuh  or  torches  with  a  high  scorching  temperature;  and  our  impression  or 
deduction  is  that  they  were  used  as  lights  amid  the  blackness  of  the  chasm. 

And  the  Torches  (chuh)  are  used  as  Hghts  still.  One  explorer  says:  "We 
fear  that  we  shall  have  to  stay  here  clinging  to  the  rocks  until  daylight.  Our 
little  Indian  gathers  a  few  dry  stems,  ties  them  in  a  bundle,  lights  one  end,  and 
holds  it  up.  The  others  do  the  same,  and  wijh  these  Torches  we  find  a 
way  out  of  trouble." 

Observe  that  these  torches  (or  chuh  as  the  Chinese  would  call  them) 
were  not  ignited  to  warm  the  explorers.  They  were  held  aloft  to  find  or  light 
the  way  among  perilous  cliffs.      Without  their  aid  it  would  have  been  madness 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         25 


for  the  explorers  to  move.  Practically  they  were  as  men  born  blind,  but  the 
Indian  guide,  with,  knowledge  derived  from  the  depths  of  antiquity,  obtains 
the  necessary  torches  and  light  at  his  elbow.  With  one  withered  and  hot  stem 
he  ties  together  a  number,  lights  them  and  then  finds  the  way  out  of  trouble 
for  both  himself  and  his  bewildered  party.  What  have  we  here  but  a  duplica- 
tion of  the  "illumination  of  torches"  referred  to  in  the  ancient  record  ? 

17.  chuh  (the  illumination  of  torches;  a  candle;  a  torch.) 

18.  yuen  ("to  lead  or  take  by  the  hand,  to  cling  to;  to  pull  up  higher,  to 
drag  out;  to  put  forward;  to  relieve,  to  rescue") 

19.  yiu  (have,  has;  to  get.) 

20.  Ta  (Great.) 

21.  Hoh  (Canyon.) 

22.  hao  (a  mark,  classed,  a  signal.) 

23.  wei  (said  or  declared;  has;  in  the  place  of.) 

24.  wu  (no;  without;  destitute  of.) 

25.  te  (bottom.) 

It  appears  that  within  the  bottomless  Ta-hoh  or  Great  Canyon  (see  words 
19  to  25)  there  is  an  illumination  of  torches  (chuh)  and  a  pulling  up  higher,  or 
a  dragging  about  and  clinging  to  (yuen). 

Climbing  is  here  referred  to.  The  Sun  people  seem  to  have  found  loco- 
motion difficult  and  hazardous  within  the  chasm. 

The  modern  explorer  who  reached  the  irrigated  garden  plots  and  houses 
of  the  ancient  occupants,  was  himself  compelled  to  resort  to  much  climbing. 
In  one  place  he  says:  "I  find  I  can  get  up  no  farther,  and  cannot  step  back,  for 
I  dare  not  let  go  with  my  hands,  and  cannot  reach  foot-hold  below   without.     I 

call  to  Bradley  for  help The  moment  is  critical.     Standing  on  my  toes  my 

muscles  begin  to  tremble I  hug  close  to  the  rock,  let  go  with  my  hand, 

seize  the  dangling  legs,  and  with  his  assistance,  I  am  enabled  to  gain  the  top" 
(n.64.) 

It  will  be  seen  by  the  intelligent  reader  that  the  forgoing  performance  is 
covered  by  the  term  yuen  (No.  18)  used  in  the  ancient  record.  There  was  a 
rescue  by  Bradley,  and  the  desperate  adventurer,  a  chief  of  the  Ethnological 
Bureau,  was  "pulled  up  higher,*'  even  to  "the  top"  of  the  cliff.  All  this  con- 
stitutes yuen;  and  without  intending  it,  our  modern  climber — calling  to  Bradley 
for  help — is  a  most  eloquent  and  lucid  commentator  on  the  ancient  statement 
in  the  Chinese  text. 

But  this  climbing  should  be  accomplished  in  connection  with  chuh  { No. 
17 — the  illumination  of  torches).  Is  it  true  that  there  is  climbing  by  torchlight 
(not  moonlight,  gentle  reader)  within  the  chasm  ? 

Light  is  thrown  on  the  ancient  text  by  a  statement  already  in  part  quoted: 
"We  fear  that  we  shall  have  to  stay  here  clinging  to  the  rocks  until  daylight. 
Our  little  Indian  gathers  a  few  dry  stems,  ties  them  in  a  bundle,  lights  one  end, 
and  holds  it  up.  The  others  do  the  same,  and  with  these  torches  we  find  a 
way  out  of  trouble.  Helping  each  other,  holding  torches  for  each  other,  one 
clinging  to  another's  hand  until  we  get  footing,  then  supporting  the   other   on 


26         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


his  shoulders,  so  we  make  our  passage  into  the  depths  of  the  canyon.  And 
now  Captain  Bishop  has  kindled  a  huge  fire  of  driftwood,  on  the  bank  of  the 
river.  This  and  the  fires  in  the  gulch  opposite,  and  our  own  flaming  torches, 
light  up  little  patches,  that  make  more  manifest  the  awful  darkness  below. 
Still,  on  we  go,  for  an  hour  or  two>  and  at  last  we  see  Captain  Bishop  coming 
up  the  gulch,  with  a  huge  torch-light  on  his  shoulders.  He  looks  like  a  fiend 
waving  brands  and  lighting  the  fires  of  hell,  and  the  men  in  the  opposite  gulch 
are  imps  lighting  delusive  fires  in  inaccessible  crevices,  over  yawning  chasms. 
....  At  last  we  meet  Captain  Bishop  with  his  flaming  torch"  (n.  65).  And  so 
the  brilliant  description  continues. 

What  is  all  this  but  the  chuh  yuen  of  the  ancient  record  ?  Here  surely  is 
"an  illumination  of  torches." 

Torches  and  Climbmg,  say  the  Ancients. 

Torches  and  Climbing,  say  the  Moderns. 


We  can  readily  understand  why  the  ancient  occupants  of  the  stone  houses 
in  the  Grand  Canyon,  should  have  used  the  torches  so  liberally  and  conven- 
iently supplied  by  nature  throughout  the  region  where  their  light  is  too  often 
sadly  or  desperately  needed.  We  have  been  informed  by  a  modern  visitor 
that  ruined  cave  habitations  are  to  be  seen  along  "lofty  and  inaccessible  ledges." 
And  these  dwellings  "were  reached  by  very  narrow,  precipitous,  and  devious 
paths,  and  being  extremely  difficult  to  attain  by  the  occupants  themselves,  pre- 
sented an  impregnable  front  to  invaders." 

Surely  here  torches  would  often  come  in  handy. 

Dr.  Fewkes  believes  that  the  ancient  occupants  of  the  cliff  or  cave  houses 
chose  hazardous  sites  in  order  to  be  out  of   the    reach    of    enemies.     He    says: 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         27 


"The  pressure  of  outside  tribes,  or  what  may  be  called  human  environment, 
probably  had  mucji  to  do  originally  with  the  choice  of  caves  for  houses.  The 
experienced  archaeologist  also  draws  attention  to  Jackson's  remark  that  finger 
imprints  answering  to  those  of  women,  "may  still  be  traced  in  the  mortar"  of 
the  dwellings  (n.  66).  Many  interiors  indeed  are  covered  with  smooth  plaster 
in  which  the  impressions  of  small  and  delicate  fingers  appear. 

Of  course,  women  and  children  formerly  lived  on  the  "inaccessible  ledges"; 
and  sons,  fathers,  husbands,  or  brothers,  away  perhaps  hunting  in  distant  glens 
or  forests,  were  comparatively  free  from  anxiety  concerning  the  condition  of 
loved  ones  at  home.  And  if  savages  with  tomahawks  and  scalping  knives 
came  stealing  through  ravines  to  the  foot  of  impregnable  stairways,  the  mothers 
aloft,  pressing  children  to  their  breasts  and  looking  down  on  bafHed  foes,  must 
have  felt  something  of  the  emotion  which  throbs  through  the  well-known  lines, 
written  indeed  by  a  woman, — 

For  the  strength  of  the  hills  we  bless  Thee, 

Our  God,  our  fathers'  God ! 
Thou  hast  made  Thy  children  mighty 

By  the  touch  of  the  mountain  sod; 
Thou  hast  fixed  our  ark  of  refuge 

Where  the  spoiler's  foot  ne'er  trod;  — 
For  the  strength  of  the  hills  we  bless  Thee, 

Our  God,  our  fathers'  God  I 

And  if  in  the  darkness  of  night,  the  awaited  signal  or  cry  were  heerd  aris- 
ing  from  the  heart  of  the  abyss,  how  quickly  the  doors  would  be  opened  and 
ropes  lowered  and  torches  Ughtea  to  help  the  hunters  to  their  homes  on  high  I 
Torches  flaming  and  eyes  gleaming.  Lights  flashing  in  all  directions.  An 
illumination  of  torches.  No  wonder  the  Canyon  was  noted  for  its  chuh  yuen 
and  cave  dwellings. 

Lights,  Climbing,  and  Caves,  say  the  Ancients. 

Lights,  Climbing,  and  Caves,  say  the  Moderns. 

The  account  continues  thus: 

26.  Leang  (the  principal,  the  chief;  a  bridge,  a  beam.) 

27.  kien  (official  writing;  to  mark;  a  slip  of  bamboo  for  making  notes  on; 
a  classifier  of  folios  or  sheets. ) 

28.  wan  (strokes,  lines,  literature,  literary;  a  despatch.) 

29.  Ta  (Great.) 

30.  Hoh  (Canyon.) 

3\.  fu  (lo  spread  abroad  as  decrees;  to  exact;  to  demand.) 
A  leang  or  chief  is  here  referred  to  in  connection  with  the  Great  Canyon. 
The  ruler  is  not  exactly  called  the  King  or  supreme  head  (chwen  suh).  In- 
deed, we  have  been  already  informed  that  the  head  ruler  wss  a  mere  nurse- 
ling (at  the  time  when  he  abandoned  his  Lute  in  the  Canyon)  and  such  an 
infant  carried  about  by  the  mother  who  had  just  brought  him  into  the  world, 
among  the  cliffs  and  canyons,  would  evidently  have  been  unable  to  either  write 
or  issue    decrees.     Of    course,    however,    a  nominally    subordinate    chief    (or 


28         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


leang)  might  have  attended  to  the  details  of  government  and  ruled  or  directed 
the  movements  of  the  Sun  people  in  the  name  of  the  infant  King.  Such  a 
minister  might  have  spread  abroad  decrees  or  commands  within  the  Canyon. 

Are  any  writings  to  be  seen  on  its  walls  ? 

An  explorer  already  in  part  quoted,  says:  "At  last  we  meet  Captain  Bishop 

with  his  flaming  torch On  a  broad  shelf  we  find  the  ruins  of  an  old  stone 

house,  the  walls  of  which  are  broken  down,  and  we  can  see  where  the  ancient 
people  who  lived  here— a  race  more  highly  civilized  than  the  present — had 
made  a  garden,  and  used  a  great  spring,  that  comes  out  of  the  rocks,  for  irriga- 
tion.   On  some  rocks  near  by  we  discover  some  curious  etchings*'  (n.  67). 

Here  are  cliff  writings. 

Again,  on  the  brink  of  a  rock  200  feet  high  stands  an  old  house.      Its  walls 

are  of  stone,  laid  in  mortar,  with  much  regularity On  the  face  of  the  cliff, 

under  the  building  and  along  down  the  river  for  200  or  300  yards,  there  are 
many  etchings." 

Here  are  writings  "spread  abroad"  within  the  Ta-hoh  or  Great  Canyon. 
Not  painted  on  the  cliffs,  but  cut  into  the  stone  I  Beyond  the  reach  or  malice 
of  savage  tribes,  they  doubtless  furnished  directions  to  friendly  clans,  telling 
where  certain  companies  had  moved,  and  so  forth. 

"On  many  of  the  tributaries  of  the  Colorado  I  have  heretofore  examined 
their  deserted  dwellings.  .  .  .  Sometimes  the  mouths  of  caves  have  been  walled 
across  and  there  are  many  other  evidences  to  show  their  anxiety  to  secure 
defensible  positions.      Probably  the  nomadic  tribes  were  sweeping  down  upon 

them,  and  they  resorted  to  these  cliffs  and  canyons  for  safety Here  I  stand 

where  these  now  lost  people  stood  centuries  ago,  and  look  over  this  strange 
country." 

The  former  chief  of  the  Ethnological  Bureau  also  says  that  at  the  mouth  of 
the  Colorado  Chiquito  he  discovered  some  curious  remains,  such  as  ruins  and 
pottery,  also  "etchings  and  hieroglyphics  on  the  rocks." 

Some  of  the  cliff  or  cave  dwellings  are  singularly  impressive.  Baron  Nord- 
enskiold,  says  of  one,  called  the  "Cliff  Palace,"  that  it  well    deserves    its    proud 

name,  "for  with  its  round  towers  and  high  walls deep  in  the  mysterious 

twilight  of  the  cavern,  and  defying  in  their  sheltered  site  the  ravages  of  time,  it 
resembled  at  a  distance  an  enchanted  castle." 

And  Chapin  exclaims:  "Surely  its  discoverer  had  not  overstated  the  beauty 
and  magnitude  of  this  strange  ruin.  There  it  was,  occupying  a  great  oval  space 
under  a  grand  cliff  wonderful  to  behold,  appearing  like  an  immense  ruined  cas- 
tle with  dismantled  towers"  (n.  68). 

And  yet  Dr.  Fewkes  very  rationally  refuses  to  regard  it  as  a  "palace" — 
occupied  merely  by  a  king  and  servants  or  else  officers  of  state  managing  an 
empire.  Of  course  some  nook  within  sheltered  its  ruler.  But  it  is  merely  a 
pueblo — set  within  a  cave.  One  French  visitor  says:  "II  est  probable  que  Cliff- 
Palace  n'abritait  pas  moins  de  503  personnes"  (n.  69). 

At  this  rate  it  would  have  required  forty  such  structures  (or  equivalent 
clusters  of  apartments)  to  sheker,  say,  20,000  individuals. 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         29 


There  is  mention  of  cave  dwellings  in  connection  with  the  Great  Canyon; 
and  as  Sun  people^with  a  supreme  ruler  (although  but  a  suckling)  are  repre- 
sented  as  climbing  within  the  chasm,  with  the  aid  of  torches,  we  expect  to  find 
curious  remains  in  connection  with  the  caverns.  Nor  are  we  disappointed. 
Here  are  mouths  of  caves  walled  up  for  defensive  purposes.  Here  are  ram- 
parts, towers,  and  fortified  structures  classed  with  castles. 

We  are  informed  that  decrees  were  spread  abroad  in  the  Canyon;  and 
searching  for  the  ancient  inscriptions,  we  find  that  they  are  cut  into  the  cliffs. 
This  shows  that  the  former  dwellers  were  able  to  cut  and  work  stone;  and 
abundant  remains  of  masonry  are  at  hand  to  sustain  this  deduction. 

The  personality  of  the  ju,  or  suckling  ruler,  remains  to  be  investigated, 
and  should  yield  curious— most  surprising — results;  but,  of  course,  reasonable, 
logical  critics  will  not  for  an  instant  confound  such  an  inquiry  with  that  just 
finished.  Even  absolute  failure  to  unearth  the  facts  with  regard  to  the  Prince 
and  his  royal  mother,  can  not  shake  the  plain  fact  that  we  have  actually  found 
an  account  of  the  Grand  Canyon,  the  Colorado  River,  and  the  Gulf  of  Califor- 
nia, in  an  ancient  Chinese  book. 

PIMO  AND  THE  CASAS  GRANDES 

It  may  further  be  remarked  that  the  Chinese  paragraph  which  immed- 
iately  follows  the  account  of  our  Canyon,  mentions  a  place  called  "Pi-mo." 

This  is  its  pronunciation  in  Canton,  but  in  Shanghai,  where  mo  is  accord- 
ed the  sound  of  mu  (see  Williams*  diet.  p.  II 54  and  p.  1 186,  column  6)  Pi-md 
would  be  called  Pi-mu.  Now,  this  Pi-mo  or  Pi-mu  is  said  (see  existing  trans- 
lation) to  be  situated  in  the  "south-east  corner  of  the  desert  beyond  the  eastern 
sea." 

Proceeding  eastward  until  the  "Eastern  Sea,"  which  washes  the  coast  of 
China,  is  crossed,  the  modern  investigator  reaches  California  and  Arizona.  And 
here,  in  the  region  or  basin  of  the  Colorado,  he  finds  a  place  still  called  "Pi-mo." 
It  is  in  Arizona,  with  a  "desert"  of  sand — the  desert  of  California  and  Sonora — 
to  its  west  and  south,  and  a  region  of  running  streams,  grass,  and  forests  to  its 
east.  Pimo  is  itself  in  the  "desert" — in  a  "south-east  corner  of  the  desert  be- 
yond the  Eastern  Sea."  It  is  entirely  dependent  on  artificial  irrigation  for  its 
limited  power  to  support  human  beings. 

Here  are  ruined  buildings  whose  origin  is  shrouded  in  mystery  and  around 
or  about  which  controversies  have  raged  for  centuries. 

One  visitor,  an  American  officer,  states  that  his  General  "asked  a  Pimo, 
who  made  the  house  I  had  seen?"  The  house  was  one  of  the  Casas  Grandes 
in  the  neighborhood  of  Pimo.  Who  had  made  it?  was  now  the  question. 
The  reply  was:  "It  was  built  by  the  son  of  the  most  beautiful  woman  who 
once  dwelt  in  yon  mountain;  she  was  fair  and  all  the  handsome  men  came  to 
court  her,  but  in  vain;  when  they  came,  they  paid  tribute,  and  out  of  this  small 
store  she  fed  all  people  in  times  of  famine  and  it  did  not  diminish." 

Moreover,  "at  last  she  brought  forth  a  boy,  who  was  the  builder  of  all 
these  houses." 


30         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


The  Pimo  Indian  "seemed  unwilling  to  talk  about  them,  but  said  there 
were  plenty  more  of  them  to  the  north,  south,  west,  etc."    (note  70.) 

[Was  the  royal  suckling  or  Prince  ever  carried  down  into  the  neighboring 
Grand  Canyon  by  the  beneficient  being,  his  mother?  Was  he  a  shao  hao  (as 
the  Chinese  might  say)  or  little  Child  of  the  Sun?  Did  he  ever  see  the  Cliff 
Palace?  Were  he  and  his  people  connected  with  the  cave  and  cliff-dwellings? 
And  when  he  retired  from  the  Canyon  did  he  fail  to  take  with  him  a  Lute?] 

If  the  royal  suckling  (or  ju)  of  the  Chinese  account  ever  actually  lived  in 
the  neighborhood  of  the  Grand  Canyon,  or  in  the  vicinity  of  Pimo,  and  was 
connected  with  a  restless  or  troubled  nation  of  Cliff  Dwellers  or  stone-house 
builders,  why  should  not  the  Indians  have  some  traditional,  even  if  but  hazy 
recollection  of  both  the  suckling  and  his  imperial  mother?  The  forefathers  of 
the  Pimos  must  have  beheld  them,  and  it  is  difficult  to  suppose  that  the 
ancient  legendary  knowledge  has  completely  evaporated  from  the  aboriginal 
memory.  As  we  have  learned  the  construction  of  the  Casas  Grandes  at  Pimo 
is  connected  with  the  advent  or  movements  of  an  intelligent,  even  if  harassed 
race  of  Builders  who  owed  allegiance  to  a  Princess  or  her  child.  And  if  it  is  a 
fact  that  in  a  time  of  famine  the  royal  lady  fed  the  ancestors  of  the  Pimos,  we 
wonder  not  that  the  nation  has  enshrined  her  image  within  its  ceaseless, 
throbbing  heart.  The  hill-top  on  which  she  gave  birth  to  her  suckling  is 
remembered  to  the  present  hour  and  was  pointed  to  by  the  Pimo  interpreter 
when  telling  the  American  General  about  the  merciful  being  who  fed  the 
hungry  in  a  time  of  famine  (and  perhaps  had  relieved  or  cheered  his  own 
ancestor.) 

Let  us  not  overlook  or  snub  the  fact  that  Pimo — the  Pimo  of  "the  region 
beyond  the  Eastern  Sea"  is  actually  mentioned  in  the  same  breath  with  the 
Grand  Canyon  and  the  Gulf.  It  is  represented  by  characters  numbered  9  and 
10  in  the  extract  from  the  ancient  Chinese  volume,  now  set  before  the  patient 
and  intelligent  reader  who  appreciates  or  perceives  the  difficulties  connected 
with  the  present  investigation. 

The  last  column  (reading  from  right  to  left)  consists  of  12  characters,  which 
express  the  following  sense:  Ta — Hd— east— south — corner-  -has — shan(moun<. 
tain  or  height) — called — Pi  mo — ti— kiu. 

The  1 1th  term,  ti,  stands  for  "place;"  and  a  kiu  is  a  level-topped  hill.  As 
it  is  also  called  a  shan  (see  No.  7),  the  kiu  should  be  a  prominent  eminence 
having  a  level  space  on  top. 

The  name  Pi-mo  is  expressed  by  putting  Pi,  which  signifies  "skin"  or 
"case,"  along  with  mo,  which  simply  stands  for  "mother." 

A  mother,  or  a  maternal  case  is  connected  with  the  Pi-mo  kiu  or  level- 
topped  hill.  Is  such  an  eminence  to  be  seen  in  the  vicinity  of  Pi-mo?  Has  it 
a  flat  summit?  Are  there  any  signs  that  it  was  inhabited  by  the  queen  of  the 
Builders?  The  Pimo  Indian  told  the  general  that  on  the  hill-top  in  the  vicinity 
— in  the  Lower  Gila  Valley —  a  female  ruler  gave  birth  to  a  child.  Is  there 
any  foundation  for  the  legend?     Where  is  her  house? 

Referring  to  the  structures  in  Arizona,  an  observer  draws  particular  at- 
tention to  one  "comparatively  intact  in  the  lower  Gila  valley.*'     He   says :  "The 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRANb  CANYON.         31 


7  "ill  iij,  i-  s» 

"fk  i  IS  f  a 
«A  ^  «  » 


-^^V- 


■WHHHI 


32         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


hill  on  which  it  is  built  rises  abruptly  from  the  surrounding  lowlands  to  the 
height  of  a  full  thousand  feet.  Near  the  northwest  corner  the  ancient  strategists 
began  at  a  height  of  thirty  feet,  carving  a  narrow  pathway  to  the  summit. 
Here  an  irregular  stone  staircase  has  been  made,  passable  by  one  person  at  a 
time.  At  intervals  watchtowers  were  constructed,  from  which  huge  boulders 
could  be  hurled  down  upon  the  advancing  foe. 

"The  road  makes  three  complete  circles  above  the  hill  before  reaching  the 
upper  level."  [Here  is  a  level-topped  hill  or  kiu.]  "Here  another  monument 
of  early  fortitude  inspired  by  the  love  of  life  presents  itself.  There  is,  perhaps, 
three  acres  of  level  rock  on  the  summit.  For  a  depth  of  nearly  two  feet  the 
entire  plateau  is  covered  with  rich  soil  'packed  up'  from  below.  When  one 
pauses  to  think  of  the  immense  labor  involved  in  carrying  this  mass  of  earth 
up  the  irregular  winding  stone  staircase,  a  feeling  of  admiration  springs  up  for 
these  simple  patient  people." 

It  is  plain  that  there  is  a  level-topped  hill  (or  kiu)  in  the  vicinity  of  Pimo. 
And  it  is  directly  connected  in  Indian  tradition  with  the  movements  of  a  race  of 
builders  who  reared  "all  these  houses,"  and  were  directed  or  governed  by  a 
beneficient  being  who  here  gave  birth  to  a  remarkable  prince.  But  it  is  enough 
at  present  to  observe  that  the  Chinese  symbols  connect  Pimo — the  Pimo  of  the 
"region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea" — with  a  Mother,  or  notable  Birth.  And  when 
the  American  General — in  our  region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea  — inquires  at 
Pimo  for  information,  concerning  its  now  silent  and  forsaken  ruins,  the  Pimo  in- 
terpreter instantly  responds  by  raising  his  arm  and  pointing  to  the  hill  of  the 
royal  birth. 

The  Hill  of  the  Maternal  Case  is  there,  say  the  Chinese. 

The  Hill  of  the  Maternal  Case  is  Here,  say  the  Pimos. 

The  hill  is  prominent  or  lofty  and  quite  level  on  top.  It  iis  in  truth  a  kiu 
(pronounced  like  our  own  word  cue)  and  holds  aloft  some  impregnable 
dwellings  and  also  a  green  spot  or  abandoned  garden—clay  having  been 
carried  aloft  a  thousand  feet  by  devoted  Builders  in  part  to  raise  flowers  for  the 
young  mother.  But,  of  course,  her  own  bud  was  the  brightest  of  all.  And 
every  one  told  her  so.  And  what  a  wide  view^  from  the  summitl  And  how 
cool  the  air  up  there!  How  different  from  the  blazing  Canyon  (with  its  hidden 
or  abandoned  Lute.) 

"The  General  asked  a  Pimo,  who  made  the  house  I  had  seen?  'It  is  the 
Casa  de  Montezuma',  said  he;  it  was  built  by  the  son  of  the  most  beautiful 
woman  who  once  dwelt  in  yon  mountain;  she  was  fair — " 

Notice  here  the  name  "Montezuma." 

The  Casas  Grandes  at  Pimo  were  fortunately  seen  by  Spanish  explorers  in 
the  16th  century,  and  "the  Indians  then  assigned  them  an  age  of  no  less  than 
500  years."     (note  71.) 

Of  course  the  Casa  Grande  Montezuma  (or  Builder  Prince  of  the  llth 
century)  could  not  have  been  the  Montezuma  who  was  overthrown  by  Cortez 
in  the  16th  century.  As  well  confound  William  of  Normandy  with  William  of 
Holland,  because  each  was  a  William!     Let  fools  do  that! 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         33 


One  writer  says  with  regard  to  the  legends  of  the  sedentary  Indians,  that 
"the  name  of  Montezuma  runs  through  all  of  these— not  generally  referring  to 
the  king  whom  we  are  accustomed  to  identify  with  that  name,  but  to  the  great 
chief  of  the  golden  or  heroic  age."  (n.  72) 

There  are  noticeable  variations  in  the  name  or  title  of  the  ancient  king. 
This  one  Spanish  explorer  speaks  of  "the  Casa  Grande,  or  palace  of  Moc-te- 
zuma"  (n.  73.) 

Here  we  have  Moc  (or  Mok,  as  it  is  by  others  spelle^ instead  of  Mon  (ti- 
zuma. ) 

Another  authority  furnishes  the  spelling  Mo-te-cuh-zoma,  and  adds,  that 
it  is  "found  written  also  Moc-te-zuma,  Mu-teczuma,  Mo-texuma"  (n.  74.) 

Notice  the  three  different  spellings  or  sounds — Mo,  Mu,  and  Mok,  prefixed 
to  "te-zuma.." 

The  title  te  or  ti  (or  te-cuh )  signifies  warrior  or  lordly  ruler  (n,  75.)  A» 
for  suma  it  is  said  to  mean  "sad.  angry,  or  severe."  [But  soma  may  include 
an  allusion  to  the  water  of  immortality  and  embrace  the  notion  of  divine 
descent.] 

Mok  (the  te-zuma)  Mo  or  Mu  were  names  or  titles  bestowed  on  the 
1 1  th  century  Builder  Prince  who  was  connected  with  the  construction  of  the 
Casas  Grandes  in  the  Pimo  section,  and  was  born  on  a  prominent  hill-top  there. 
He  was  Mok,  Mo  or  Mu. 

Turning  to  the  Chinese  account  we  find  that  the  royal  ju  or  suckling 
connected  wtih  the  region  of  the  Grand  Canyon  and  Pimo,  was  likewise  known 
as  Mu.    (note  76.) 

In  addition,  the  suckling  is  repeatedly  called  a  ti  (or  te  as  it  is  just  as  often 
spelled.)  And  this,  so  far,  agrees  with  the  title  of  the  Pimo  infant,  whose  name 
is  frequently  said  to  be  Mu-ti  (zuma.) 

A  Mu-ti,  say  the  Chinese. 

A  Mu-ti,  say  the  Pimos. 

According  to  the  Chinese  record,  the  imperial  (ti  or  te)  heir  apparent  (or 
yuen-tsz)  suckling  or  baby  (ju)  whose  estate  or  patrimony  (chan)  was 
Loh-ming  (name  of  a  region)  lived  or  resided  (ku)  as  the  tender,  delicate 
youth  (yao)  Mu. 

Here  we  see  that  the  heir  apparent  the  ju  or  baby  was  both  Mu  and  a  ti. 
The  old  account  connects  the  infantile  ruler  with  a  region  called  Loh-ming. 
We  need  not  delay  to  ascertain  the  position  of  this  province  or  land;  enough 
now  to  observe  that  wherever  it  was,  the  ju  and  ti  lived  there  (or  lived  some 
where)  as  the  pleasing  and  tender  Mu. 

The  baby  was  Mu. 

This  name,  like  some  of  our  own  names,  such  as  Grace,  Patience,  Clement, 
is  frequently  used  as  tn  adjective.  It  may  stand  for  either  "beauty"  or 
"majesty,"  but  it  is  also,  at  times,  a  surname,     (note  77.) 


34         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


As  already  seen,  the  Great  Canyon  with  the  connected  bottomless  abyss,  in 
the  region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea,  is  connected  with  the  Sun  and  Moon  Shan. 
And  on  this  Shan  is  "the  Great  Men's  Country"  (see  existing  translation.) 
Now  a  Chinese  comment  (note  78)  informs  us  that  the  forts  of  the  entirely 
great  Mu  formerly  held  or  possessed  this  Great  Men's  Country  (which  is  on 
the  Sun  and  Moon  Shan.) 

Information  is  next  furnished  concerning  the  largest  Walrusses,  and  it  is 
plain  that  the  polar  region  is  referred  to.  The  account  is  quite  clear,  as  any 
Chinese  scholar  can  see,  now  that  we  have  pointed  out  the  position  of  the 
passage. 

It  might  seem  advisable  to  prove  that  the  haunt  of  the  Walrus  was  known 
to  the  ancient  Chinese  writers  who  have  furnished  accounts  of  America,  but  it 
is  unneccessary  to  do  this,  seeing  that  the  phenomenon  of  Ten  Suns,  which  is 
only  visible  at  the  Artie  Circle,  is  referred  to  in  the  ancient  books,  Moreover, 
as  we  have  learned,  appearances  of  five  or  seven  suns  (or  moons)  shining 
simultaneously  in  the  sky,  are  distinctly  connected  with  the  Sun  and  Moon  Shan. 
It  was  therefore  known  that  the  mountain  system  of  North  America,  stretches 
upward— like  the  Branches  of  a  Tree— from  the  vicinity  of  the  Grand  Canyon 
to  the  Polar  region,  or  place  of  the  Ten  Suns.  And  from  a  point  here,  the 
shores  of  North-eastern  Tartary  or  Asia  can  be  seen  without  even  the  aid  of  an 
opera-glass. 

It  now  appears  that  in  the  remote  past  there  was  a  ruler  named  Mu  dwell- 
ing in  the  mountainous  land  w^hich  stretches  from  the  Grand  Canyon  to  the 
Artie  Ocean.     His  domain  was  on  the  Sun  and  Moon  Shan. 

And  he  had  fortified  dwellings  or  forts. 

Where,  today,  are  the  remains  of  the  ancient  strongholds? 

One  observer  says  with  reference  to  the  cliff-dwellings,  that  they  "have 
the  appearance  of  fortified  retreats.     The  occupants,  on  account  of  "decending 

hordes  devised  these  unassailable  retreats The  builders  hold  no  small- 

est  niche  in  recorded  history.  Their  aspirations,  their  struggles  and  their  fate 
are  all  unwritten,  save  in  these  crumbling  stones,  which  are  their  sole  monu- 
ments and  meagre  epitaph.  Here  once  they  dwelt.  They  left  no  other  print 
on  time."  (note  79.) 

The  "unassailable  retreats"  noticed  by  this  melancholy  writer  may  well 
be  some  of  the  strongholds  of  Mu  and  his  followers  or  warriors.  The  ancient 
pueblos  (or  Casas  Grandes)  are  of  great  strength.  When  the  "ladders  are 
drawn  in,  the  various  sides  present  a  perpendicular  front  to  an  enemy,  and  the 
building  itself  becomes  a  fortress."  Further,  "The  strength  of  the  walls  of 
these  structures  was  proved  during  the  Mexican  war,  when  it  was  found  that 
they  were  impregnable  to  field-artillery."     (note  80) 

The  Spanish  soldier,  Castenada,  in  the  16th  century  said  with  regard  to  the 
Pimo  Casa  Grande,  that  "it  seemed  to  have  served  as  a  fortress."   (note  81 .) 

Now,  Pimo  -represented  by  the  symbols  for  a  maternal  case  and  hill — is 
mentioned  on  the  very  page  of  the  Chinese  book  which  notices  our  Grand 
Canyon.     Then,  we  are  told  that  cliff- dwellings  were  here    and    a    Sun   Prince 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         35 


(at  first  a  mere  ju  or  infant)  called  Mu,  and  that  he  or  his  followers  erected 
forts  or  fortresses. 

And  here  we  find  no  scarcity  of  ancient  strongholds. 

And  when  we  ask  the  Indians  for  the  name  of  the  ruler  who  governed  the 
now  decaying  strongholds,  their  answer  is— Mu. 

The  very  title  in  the  Chinese  book. 

Mu,  say  the  Ancients. 

Mu,  say  our  Indians. 

It  may  be  said  that  some  of  the  latter  pronounce  the  title  Mo.  One  of  our 
philologists  speaks  of  "Montezuma,  or  more  correctly,  Motecuhzoma." 
(note  82.) 

Another  authority  says:  "Montezuma,  or  more  correctly,  Moctezuma." 
(note  83.) 

In  his  account  of  the  Casa  Grande,  the  old  time  Spanish  traveler,  Padre 
Garces,  says:  On  this  river  is  situated  the  house  which  they  call  Moctezuma's 
(note  84.) 

It  is  evident  that  the  two  pronunciations  Mo  and  Mok  are  preferred  to 
Mon  (tezuma)  and  that  Mu  has  also  its  advocates. 

Curiously  enought,  these  three  sounds  Mu,  Mo,  and  Mok,  are  likewise 
applied  to  the  one  character  by  the  Chinese  literati. 

The  identical  symbol  which  Williams  calls  Mu  is  in  another  dictionary 
(see  Bailley's,  iii,  p.  246)  termed  Mo. 

Morrison  (vol.  IV,  p.  600-1 )  says  that  the  two  sounds  Mu  and  Mo  are  both 
applied,  and  that  in  Canton  this  selfsame  character  is  called  Mok. 

It  thus  appears  that  the  builder  or  ruler  of  the  fortresses  in  the  region 
beyond  the  Eastern  Sea,  might  be  called  Mu,  Mo,  or  Mok. 

And  in  the  region  referred  to — "the  region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea" — we 
find  many  strongholds  or  forts  (as  well  as  cave-dwellings;)  and  when  anti- 
quarians inquire  of  the  Indians  for  the  name  of  the  ancient  Builder  Prince,  they 
are  variously  informed  that  he  was  the  glorious  Mu,  Mo,  or  Mok. 

If  the  royal  infant  (or  ju)  became  in  process  of  time  a  ruler  of  fortresses 
(tai)  which  "formerly  held  the  Great  Men's  Country"  (on  the  Sun  and  Moon 
Shan)  would fbe  surprising  to  find  that  he  himself  had  been  born  within  the 
shelter  of  a  tai  or  fortress!  And  what  is  the  fortified  hill  at  Pimo  but  a 
fortress?  He  counts  it  as  the  first  of  the  forts  of  Mu  or  Mo-ti  in  "the  region 
beyond  the  Eastern  Sea." 

Remember  that  our  own  government  has  erected  numbers  of  forts  on  hill- 
tops throughout  the  South-west  expressly  for  the  purpose  of  holding  such  tribes 
as  the  Navajoes  and  Apaches  in  check.  (And  in  addition  we  are  furnishing 
the  red  men  with  supplies.)  But  in  the  I  Ith  century  there  were  no  Congress- 
ional appropriations,  no  detachments  of  troops  hurrying  down  from  Washington 
to  preserve  order.  Yet  the  ancestors  of  our  savage  tribes  were  certainly  there. 
And  although  the  warrior  chief  tans  immediately  around  the  young  queen 
appear  to  have  been  filled  with  jealousy  of  each  other,  it   is   certain   that   they 


36         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


were  united  as  one  in  devising  for  the  princess  a  calm  or  sure  retreat  which  no 
barbaric  host  could  take  by  assault.  From  its  base  the  savage  ranks  would 
reel,  or  break  into  foam  like  waves  of  the  sea. 

Aloft  in  this  secure  retreat  she  gave  birth  to  Mo. 

Who  was  his  father? 

The  American  General  already  referred  to,  supplies  his  own  report  of  the 
Pimo  interpreter's  words: 

"All  he  knew  was  a  tradition  amongst  them,  'that  in  bygone  days,  a  woman 
of  surpassing  beauty  resided  in  a  green  spot  in  the  mountains  near  the  place 
where  we  were  encamped.  All  the  men  admired  and  paid  court  to  her.  She 
received  the  tributes  of  their  devotion,  grain,  skins,  etc.,  but  gave  no  love  or 
other  favor  in  return.  Her  virtue  and  her  determination  to  remain  unmarried 
were  equally  firm.  There  came  a  drought  which  threatened  the  world  with 
famine.  In  their  distress,  people  applied  to  her,  and  she  gave  corn  from  her 
stock,  and  the  supply  seemed  to  be  endless.  Her  goodness  was  unbounded. 
One  day,  as  she  was  lying  asleep  with  her  body  exposed,  a  drop  of  rain  fell  on 
her  stomach,  which  produced  conception.     A  son  was  the    issue,    the    founder 

of  a  new  race  which  built  all  these    houses* The   houses    of   the    people 

(the  agricultural  or  sedentary  Pimos)  are  mere  sheds,  thatched  with  willow 
and  corn  stalks"  (n.  85.) 

This  report  is  more  rational  than  the  other  in  so  far  as  it  represents  the 
multitudinous  houses  of  stone  or  adobe  as  being  reared  by  a  "race"  rather  than 
by  a  "boy"l  But,  of  course,  the  "son"  could  not  have  been  the  "founder"  of 
his  mother  or  of  her  ancestors.  It  is  further  apparent  that  the  infant  could  not 
have  been  either  the  builder  or  inventor  of  the  house  or  stronghold  in  which 
he  was  born. 

Of  course  it  is  an  impossibility  to  get  at  the  exact  truth  in  relation  to  the 
mysterious  birth.  The  unwedded  lady's  own  account  ought  to  constitute  a 
sufficient  explanation,  and  would-  but  for  the  unfortunate  historic  fact  that  no 
mother  has  ever  been  known  to  tell  her  children  the  truth  about  their  produc- 
tion. Even  Christian  mothers  lie  precisely  like  Pagans  in  this  respect,  and  are 
just  as  thorough-going  humbugs  as  Hannah  in  the  temple,  when  questioned  for 
details.  They  will  tell  a  poor  helpless,  green,  inquiring  child,  for  instance,  that 
they  found  him  in  a  cabbage,  when  the  actual  truth  is  that  they  got  him  from  a 
stork.  We  therefore  unanimously  dismiss  their  worse  than  useless  testimony 
as  that  of  a  shameless  pack  of  preposterous  deluderers. 

It  is  probable  that  the  Pimo  princess  may  have  been  secretly  wedded  or 
united  to  some  man  whom  she  really  loved  and  preferred  to  all  others.  Yet 
an  open  avowal  of  such  preference  might  have  caused  his  death  or  might  have 
turned  the  love  of  rival  suitors  into  hate  and  brought  about  the  ruin  of  the 
already  sufficiently  perplexed  and  troubled  nation. 

But  would  not  the  birth  of  the  infant  have  revealed  all? 

Certainly,  but  in  the  present  instance  the  Queen  seems  to  have  contented 
herself  with  the  announcement  that  she  had  got  her  child  from  Heaven.  Her 
friends,  including  doubtless  the  priests,  at  once  spread  abroad  the  story  that  the 
infant— the  Child  of  the  Sun— was  of  celestial  origin.     This  tale  may    not   have 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         37 


completely  satisfied  the  numerous  rival  claimants  for  the  lady's  hand.  But  how 
disprove  it?  And  vkrhy  assail  or  shake  the  authority  of  the  beautiful  young 
queen?  Why  not  draw  closer  together,  bury  their  mutual  animosities  or  rivalries 
and  face  the  murderous  hordes  thronging  the  passes  of  the  Rocky  Mountains 
and  slopes  of  the  Mississippi  Valley?  Why  not  grasp  at  the  hope— embodied 
in  the  suckling  born  on  the  hilltop— that  Heaven  had  furnished  a  leader,  a  re- 
incarnated divinity  of  the  wandering  nation,  who  would  guide  the  despairing 
people  onward  to  new  fields  of  national  glory  and  prosperity. 

It  may  of  course  be  said  that  such  predictions  were  never  realized,  but  it 
is  certain  that  they  were  cherished.  Even  the  Mokis,  Tunis  and  Pimos  still 
regard  Mo-ti  as  immortal  and  await  his  return.  He  is  "the  demigod  of  their 
earliest  traditions,  watching  over  them  from  Heaven  and  waiting  to  come  again 
to  bring  to  them  victory  and  a  period  of  millenial  glory  and  happiness"  (n.  86.) 
And,  of  course,  those  who  actually  followed  the  leader  Mu  must  have  felt 
8':rongly  the  ties  of  affection  and  veneration.  And  who  were  the  people  who 
got  across  to  Mongolia  with  accounts  of  our  Grand  Canyon,  Gulf  and  Conti- 
nental Tree — crowned  with  its  wreath  of  multiplied  suns? 

[Doubtless  the  notion  that  our  Mu-te  (or  Te-Mu)  was  of  divine  origin, 
had  a  surprising,  stimulating  effect.  Curiously  enough,  Asiatic  writers  notice  a 
Te-mu  (Te-mu-dzin  or  Temugin)  who  arose  in  Tartary  in  the  early  part  of 
the  12th  century,  and  therfore  might  be  regarded  as  the  contemporary  of  our 
Mu  born  at  Pimo  about  the  year  1 100.  Some  say  this  Tartarean  conqueror 
was  called  Timour  or  Temur-chi,  and  his  origin  is  wrapt  in  mystery.  One 
account  treats  him  as  a  demigod,  but  other  statements  assume  that  a  divinity 
was  his  remote  ancestor.  He  is  said  to  belong  to  the  rece  that  broke  out  of 
Irkena  Kon  (or  the  mountain  valley),  situated  in  some  out  of  the  way  and 
dangerous  region.  Personally  this  Mu  came  from  a  distant  land.  Some  his- 
torians whose  time  is  valuable  readily  find  Irkena  Kon  in  the  vicinity  of  the 
Caspian  Sea,  but  others  declare  that  it  must  be  situated  in  the  direction  of  the 
Arctic  Ocean! 

[In  his  old  age,  in  or  about  the  year  1 1 53,  this  supposed  demigod  had  a 
child  born  to  him.  The  name  of  Temudzin  or  Temugin  was  bestowed  upon 
the  infant.  When  thirteen  years  old  his  father— the  demigod— died,  and  the 
extensive  empire  which  the  parent  had  established  fell  into  political  pieces. 
Gibbon,  in  his  "Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire,"  chap.  LXIV,  says  that 
the  young  prince  Temugin  could  only  claim  authority  over  about  12,000  fami- 
lies. We  should  never  overlook  this  fact  when  contemplating  his  career. 
Every  incident  in  his  history  is  known.  His  name  has  resounded  through  the 
world.  He  rose  to  be  a  mighty  conqueror.  He  became  Jenghiz  Khan— King 
of  Kings—grandsire  of  Kublai  Khan,  ancestor  of  Tamerlane  and  the  Great 
Moguls,  and  of  no  end  of  Persian  or  Moslem  Sultans  or  Kings. 

[The  immediate  followers  of  Jenghiz  Khan  always  declared  that  success 
awaited  him  because  he  was  the  son  of  a  God.  Petis  de  la  Croix  denounces 
such  a  claim  as  a  piece  of  "insolence,"  yet  it  might  better  be  regarded  as  a 
form  of  delusion.  But  notice  the  victorious  lengths  to  which  this  delusion 
carried  believers.     And  the  notion  promulgated  at  Pimo,  in  the  midst  of  crowd- 


38         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


ing  calamities,— that  the  royal  infant  was  a  Son  of  Heaven,-  -might  have  been 
intended  to  console  and  stimulate  a  despairing  nation.  And  the  spiritual  stim- 
ulus appears  to  have  transported  its  believers  to  such  lengths  that  aboriginal 
Americans  seem  to  have  lost  track  of  the  demigod,  and  know  not  from  what 
point  he  may  return. 

[The  father  of  Temugin  was  the  founder  of  the  Yuen  dynasty,  or  at  all 
events  an  ancestral  king.  He  is  generally  called  Yisukai  or  Pysukai  Behadur, 
but  such  is  a  mere  title,  signifying  "9th  hero,"  and  not  a  proper  name  at  all. 
Some  lucid  commentators  will  positively  tell  us  that  it  was  not  the  father 
of  Jenghiz  Khan,  but  his  9th  father  or  ancestor,  who  was  the  God.  But  with 
such  hair-splitting  we  need  not  concern  ourselves.  Enough  to  note  the  uplift- 
ing, psychological  effect  or  result  of  faith  or  belief  'in  divine  aid  or  protection. 
No  wonder  David  exclaims:  "Thy  rod  and  Thy  staff,  they  comfort  me." 

[In  the  case  of  the  Tartars,  the  remits  of  their  exalfed  faith  were  indeed  sur- 
prising. The  Crusades  of  the  Christians  had  proved  a  failure.  Jerusalem  had 
passed  from  their  hands.  Richard,  King  of  England,  had  been  taken  prisoner. 
The  Moslems,  according  to  Gibbon,  were  preparing  for  the  invasion  of  Europe. 
Their  brethren  were  actually  intrenched  in  the  heart  of  Spain.  Enraged  against 
western  nations  for  the  long  war  waged  against  their  power,  armies  were 
gathering  for  the  conquest  and  pluiider  of  Christendom.  The  crescent  instead 
of  the  cross,  says  Gibbon,  was  to  glitter  on  the  spire  of  St.  Paul's. 

[But  at  this  very  juncture,  Jenghiz  Khan  and  his  followers  came  pouring 
forth  from  the  wilds  of  Tartary.  The  Sultan  felt  secure  within  his  line  of  forti- 
fied cities  which  hitherto  had  repelled  every  assault.  But  the  Tartarean  host — 
led  by  warriors  of  the  race  from  Irkena  Kon— overthrew  the  Moslems  in  every 
encounter.  They  ransacked  the  provinces  and  gave  the  cities  to  the  flames. 
And  the  children  or  successors  of  the  conqueror  completed  the  work  which  he 
had  begun.  Bagdad  which  for  ages  had  successfully  defied  the  invading, 
crusading  armies  of  Europe,  was  destroyed,  and  an  end  put  to  the  Ca-iphate  so 
long  enthroned  within  its  historic  walls.  The  conquest  of  China  was  completed 
by  Kublai  Khan,  and  «n  empire  formed  which  stretched  from  the  Indian  Ocean 
to  the  Arctic,  and  from  the  Pacific  to  the  Mediterranean  Sea.) 

Even  traditions  of  tribes  that  most  certainly  remained  behind  in  Arizona 
and  consequently  did  not  disappear  in  company  with  the  mysterious  Mu  or 
Mo-te,  declare  that  he  was  an  agent  of  Providence.  He  was  the  "equal"  of 
the  "Great  Spirit"  and  "was  often  considered  identical  with  the  Sun"  (n.  87.) 
Had  he  remained  in  Arizona,  his  son  in  due  time  might  have  claimed  divine 
descent  through  his  father  the  demigod. 

CHINESE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THE  PIMO  DEMIGOD. 

But  if  the  Mu-te  (or  Te-Mu,)  builder  or  ruler  of  fortresses  in  the  region  of 
Pimo  and  the  Grand  Canyon,  was  identical  with  our  Pimo  Mu-te,  he  should  be 
referred  to  as  semi-divine,  in  the  Chinese  record. 

And  so  he  actually  is.  Even  here  the  evidence  does  not  fail.  But  con- 
ception of  the  little  sun-child  did  not  occur  on    the    well   watched    or    guarded 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         39 


hilltop  at  Pimo.  It  was  in  a  green  wilderness  noted  for  its  hay  or  grass  and 
butchering  of  beasts,  that  a  phantasm  approached  the  female — and  so  on. 

Fortunately  we  can  turn  away  from  this  particular  account  of  the  visit  of 
incubus,  seeing  that  the  necessary  information  is  more  conveniently  furnished 
elsewhere  (n.  88.)  The  name  of  a  mountain,  which  may  or  may  not  have  been 
far  indeed  from  the  Grand  Canyon,  is  furnishsd,  and  we  are  informed  that 
Shao  Hao  dwelt  (ku)  there  (chi.)  In  addition  he  is  called  a  soverign  (ti  or  te) 
and  a  shan. 

Now  this  term,  shan,  according  to  Williams  (p.  737.)  stands  for  "the  gods, 
the  divinities,  a  god,  a  supernatural  good  being;  divine;  spiritual,  as  being 
higher  than  man;  godlike,  wonderful,  superhuman;  to  deify. 

The  Shao  Hao  (or  Mu-ti)  is  a  shan  or  god. 

A  god!  say  the  Chinese. 

A  god!  say  the  Indians. 

Taking  the  account  as  it  stands,  it  appears  that  an  incarnated  god  (\n  the 
shape  of  the  Shao  Hao  Mu)  was  at  one  time  within  the  Grand  Canyon  (which 
still  retains  his  "lute." ) 

Notice  that  the  "country  contiguous  to  the  mighty  chasm  is  called  the 
"Shao  Hao's  country." 

Next  observe  that  the  vast  chasm  (or  ta-hoh)  is  itself  called  the  Great 
Canyon  of  the  Incarnated  God  (or  Keang  Shang. )  Shang  stands  for  "Heaven" 
or  supreme;'*  and  Keang  signifies  "to  decend  from  a  higher  level,  to  come  from 
the  sky,  to  fall  as  rain,  to  come  into  the  world  as  Christ  did"  (Williams.)  The 
contiguous  country  is  named  in  honor  of  the  Shao  Hao,  or  sun-child,  who  is 
called  a  shan  or  god.  And  "Keang  Shang's  ta-hoh"  or  great  Canyon  is  also 
named  in  honor  of  this  shan  or  god— this  incarnated  god. 

And  here,  "in  the  region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea,"  the  land  is  ringing  with 
his  name.  He  was  Mu  or  Mo-te  and  a  builder  of  forts,  and  above  and  beyond 
all  this  h;  was  an  incarnation  of  the  Great  Spirit! 

"The  name,  at  this  moment,  is  as  familiar  to  every  Indian,  Apache  and 
Navajoe  as  that  of  our  Savior  or  Washington  is  to  us*'  (n.  89.) 

Bancroft  says:  "Under  restrictions,  we  may  fairly  regard  him  as  the  Mel- 
chizedek,  the  Moses,  and  the  Messiah  of  the  Pueblo  desert- wanderers  from  an 
Egypt  that  history  is  ignorant  of,  and  whose  name  even  tradition  whispers  not." 

A  Messiah  and  Demigod!  say  the  Chinese. 

A  Messiah  and  Demigod!  say  Americans. 

Bancroft,  says,  that  according  to  Indian  paintings  or  traditions,  the  Messiah 
or  Demigod  of  Pueblo  tradition  had  red  or  yellow  hair. 

Then  Mo  was  a  white  man  and  his  mother  a  white  woman. 

Such  a  conclusion  agrees  completely  with  the  teaching  of  the  ancient  Chi- 
nese book  just  quoted.  We  are  informed  with  reference  to  a  certain  mountain, 
that:  Ki  (the)  shan  (god  or  spirit)  poh  (white)  ti  (sovereign)  Shao  hao  (little 
sun-child)  ku  (dwelt)  chi  (there). 

Next  appears  a  comment  stating  in  the  plainest  possible  terms  that  Shao 
Hao  of  the  Kin  Tien  dynasty  was  a  virtuous  or  excellent  ruler. 


40         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


The  Shao  Hao  who  was  at  the  Ta-hoh  or  Great  Canyon  is  here  called  a 
White  King. 

Mons.  Rosny,  in  his  French  translation,  declares  that  the  divine  or  super- 
human Shao  Hao  was  "  Tempereur  Blanc."  (note  90.) 

One  well  known  writer  and  archaeologist  says  with  reference  to  the  build- 
ers of  some  structures  in  the  Pimo  region,  that  there  is  "reason  to  suppose  that 
they  were  a  light-skinned  people.  At  least  one  red-haired  skull  and  one  with 
still  lighter  hair  were  found.  Hair  has  been  but  rarely  found  not  over  a  half 
dozen  times  in  all.     In  three  cases  it  was  black."     (note  91.) 

According  to  aboriginal  testimony,  800  years  have  rolled  by  since  the  time 
of  burial,  and  hair  has  lingered  on  but  few  of  the  heads  it  once  adorned.  But 
when  discovered  it  is  seen  to  be  quite  different  from  the  hair  of  the  Indians. 

Those  interested  in  the  subject  of  the  Cliff-dwellers  should  study  the 
accurate  reports  of  the  Ethnological  Bureau  and  also  the  writings  of  Editor 
Peet  the  well  known  "American  Antiquarian."  These  works  should  be  in  the 
libraries  of  all  Americanists. 

According  to  the  American  Antiquarian,  Doctor  Bird  sail  reports  that  dried 
bodies  have  been  found  in  tombs  on  the  Mesa  Verde  in  Arizona  and  the  "hair 
of  the  head  has  been  found  partly  preserved  on  soms  mummies.  It  is  said  to 
be  of  fine  texture,  not  coarse  like  Indian  hair  and  varying  in  color  from  shades 

of  yellowish  brown  to  reddish  brown  and  black" The  Wetherills  exhumed 

one  mummy  having  a  short  brownish  beard."  (note  92) 

We  are  further  informed  that  mummies  have  been  taken  from  "a  hermeti- 
cally sealed  cave  in  the  Canyon  of  the  Gila  River,"and  two  of  the  bodies  were 
those  of  women.  The  females  "retain  their  long,  flowing  silken  hair."  The 
"bodies  were  covered  with  highly  colored  clothes,  which  crumbled  on  ex- 
posure. Three  kinds  were  saved,  and  one  a  deep  blue  woven  in  diamond 
shapes.  No  implements  or  utensils  were  found.  .  .  .  All  the  consuls  and  many 
scientific  men  inspected  the  mummies  yesterday.  Among  those  present  were 
Henry  A.  Ward,  of  Rochester,  N.  Y.,  Kate  Field,  Dr.  Harkness,  Academy  of 
Sciences."  Other  Doctors  and  Professors  were  present  and  also  "Historian 
Bancroft."  (n.  93.) 

In  addition  to  all  this.  Professor  C.  L.  Webster,  the  accomplished,  pains- 
taking, and  trusted  scientist  of  Charles  City,  Iowa,  has  unearthed  a  body  whose 
silent  testimony  is  truly  inestimable.  In  the  "Archaeological  Bulletin,"  issued 
by  the  International  Society  of  Archaeologists  (Madison,  Indiana,)  for  July  and 
September,  1912,  we  find  a  photograph  of  a  mummy  brought  to  light  by  the 
Professor  in  a  cliff-house  on  a  head  stream  of  the  Gila. 

The  body  is  that  of  a  child,  and  its  preservation  is  due  to  "the  chemical 
elements  of  the  soil,"  etc. 

"The  hair  on  the  head  of  the  mummy  was  of  a  beautiful  dark  brown  color, 
and  of  a  soft  and  silky  texture,"  and  "the  hair  on  the  head  of  this  mummified 
child  is  of  the  same  color  and  texture  (only  finer)  as  that  of  adults  found  braid- 
ed in  long  plaits  in  an  adjoining  room" — Page  78. 

The  Professor  beUeves  that  "different  races"  were  here  contending  for  the 
mastery  of  the  region,  and  that  "one  or  more  of  them  were  driven  out  (perhaps 
destroyed)  suddenly"  (see  article  I.) 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         41 


Another  archaeologist  says,  that  "quite  recently  hieroglyphics  were  dis- 
covered ia.the  Tonto  Basin  country,  depicting  the  driving  out  of  white  people 
by  red  men,  and  local  archaeologists  have  set  up  a  theory  that  the  people  who 
once  cultivated  these  valleys  were  white.  The  present  Indians  have  many 
legends  of  white  men  being  in  their  country  before  the  advent  of  the  Spanish 
conquistodores.  Father  Marcas  Niza,  a  pious  Jesuit,  who  accompanied  Coron- 
ado  on  his  march  through  this  section  in  search  of  the  seven  lost  cities  of  Cibola, 
speaks  frequently  of  allusions  made  by  Indians  to  white  bearded  men  who 
were  here  before"  (n.  94.) 

[In  tracking  the  missing  white  race,  remember  that  some  of  the  Toltecs, 
like  the  Mayas  of  Yucatan,  compressed  the  skull  in  childhood,  that  they  had 
among  them  a  sprinkling  of  very  large  men  (quinames,)  and  that  in  the  wilder- 
ness their  mode  of  living  would  be  more  like  that  of  Indians  than  of  cultured, 
civilized  people.] 

Mons.  Charney  has  argued  that  the  Mexican  Toltecs  were  of  a  white  race, 
but  very  foolishly  argues  (like  Baron  Humboldt)  that  the  Toltecs  marched  from 
Mongolia  to  Mexico  in  the  6th  century.  The  illustrious  Humboldt  has  served 
Archaeology  enormously  by  drawing  attention  to  the  absolute  and  startling 
identity  of  the  Zodiacal  signs  of  the  Manchu  Tartars  with  those  of  CentraJ 
America  (see  Mr.  Vining's  exceedingly  comprehensive  and  valuable  work  en- 
titled "An  Inglorious  Columbus.") 

Skilled,  scientific  archaeologists  connected  with  th«  Washington  Bureau 
have  all  along  been  contending  that  the  cliff  or  cave  dwellings,  forts,  pueblo", 
and  mounds  of  North  America  were  constructed  by  native-born  Americans, 
rather  than  by  Toltecs  moving  in,  say.  the  6th  century  from  Tartcry  to  Arizona 
or  Mexico, 

Therefore,  as  the  Toltecs  (sun-people  and  architects  or  builders)  were 
certainly  settled  in  Mexico  for  some  centuries  prior  to  the  1 1  th  (when  the  rem- 
nant disappeared,)  the  ancestors  of  the  pale-faced  and  cultured  people  (see 
Vining's  chapter  on  the  "Toltecs")  may  like  ourselves  have  reached  America 
by  crossing  the  Atlantic.  The  Greek  face,  the  Celtic  face,  the  Saxon  face,  and 
the  Jewish  or  Semitic  face  are  all  seen  carved  on  the  tottering  walls  of  temples 
and  palaces  in  Yucatan  (see  Charney's  essays.) 

Moving  to  the  Vale  of  Mexico,  the  Toltecs  tried  with  more  or  less  success 
to  keep  on  neighborly  terms  with  the  red  skinned  people.  But  thoughtless 
propagation  produced  more  mouths  than  could  be  filled— except  with  human 
flesh.  Open  war  broke  out  in  the  1 1  th  century.  The  Aztecs  or  others  of  the 
red  tribes  almost  annihilated  the  Whites;  and  Topiltzin  Qyetzalcoatl,  the  "last" 
King  of  the  Toltecs  fled  north  from  Chapultepec,— the  selfsame  Chapultepec 
which  in  our  own  day  has  seen  the  downfall  of  Maxmillian  and  the  flight 
of  Diaz. 

May  not  the'  fair  and  beautiful  Princess  at  Pimo  have  belonged  to  the  out- 
cast Mexican  royal  family?  May  not  her  idolized  child  have  inherited  titles 
absurdly  out  of  place  among  the  deserts  of  Arizona?  And  may  not  all  the 
elements  in  our  later  Yankee  nation  have  been  represented  in  the  pale-faced 
people  that  found  re f  age  among  the  canyons  and  cliffs  of  the  Colorado?  If  so, 
their  remote  or  ancestral  fathers  and  mothers  were  likewise  no  less  our  own. 


42    ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


The  curtain  of  history  rises  and  shows  the  young  Qyeen  of  the  Builders  on 
a  hill  top  at  Pimo.  The  structures  there,  according  to  aboriginal  testimony 
were  reared  about  the  year  1 100, — the  very  time  when  the  Toltecs  disappeared 
from  the  Vale  of  Mexico.  And  now  the  ruins  are  yielding  up  forms  of  the  fe- 
males who  once  tenanted  those  cliffs  and  contrived  to  get  plaster  and  paint  with 
which  to  adorn  the  now  desolate  and  trembling  walls.  And  the  yellow,  brown, 
or  silky  black  hair  on  the  heads  of  those  women  w^ho  sought  to  make  their 
bleak  and  dreary  homes  attractive,  shows  unfailingly  their  race.  Even  an 
ostrich  might  see  iti 

Mons.  Charney  declares  that  the  Toltecs  expelled  from  Mexico  in  the  1 1th 
century  were  scholars,  artists,  astronomers,  and  philosophers.  And  their  sis- 
ters were  certainly  no  less  cultured  and  refined. 

Now,  the  Shan  Hai  King  states  that  in  "the  region  beyond  the  Eastern  Sea" 
there  is  (or  was)  a  "Country  of  Refined  Gentlemen." 

And  Charney  argues  that  "a  gentle  race  were  the  Toltecs,  preferring  the 
arts  to  war." 

Refined  and  Gentle — men,  says  Charney. 

Refined  Gentlemen,  says  the  Shan  Hai  King. 

Certain  comments  collected  by  Jin  Chin  Ngan,  and  unnoticed  in  Mr.  Vin- 
ing's  translation  (p.  657),  connect  the  Refined  Gentlemen  with  pyramids  (k'iu) 
and  even  declare  that  their  dwellings  were  on  mounds  (ling). 

And  Charney  says:  "Now,  the  first  thing  that  we  find  at  the  houses  of  Tula 
is  an  example  of  a  mode  of  building  entirely  new  and  curious.  The  prevailing 
tendency  of  the  Toltec  is  to  place  his  dwellings  and  his  temples  likewise  upon 
eminences  and  pyramids." 

They  lived  upon  Mounds,  says  Charney. 

They  lived  upon  Mounds,  says  the  Shan  Hai  King. 

"They  are  very  gentle,  and  do  not  quarrel.  They  have  fragrant  plants. 
They  have  a  flowering-plant  which  produces  blossoms  in  the  morning  that  die 
in  the  evening." 

The  Chinese  account  calls  this  vegetable  production  the  Hwa  plant,  and  as 
Hwa  stands  for  "glory"  (see  Williams'  Chinese  diet.)  it  is  apparent  that  the 
"Morning  Glory  is  referred  to. 

Botanist  Wood  says:  "This  glorious  plant  is  a  native  of  Tropical  America 
and  now  universally  cultivated.  It  is  also  nearly  naturalized  with  us."  (in  the 
United  States  ) 

"The  flowers  are  ephemeral.  Beginning  to  open  soon  after  midnight,  they 
greet  the  Sun  at  his  rising,  arrayed  in  all  their  glory"  (Hwa)  "and  before  he 
reaches  the  meridian,  fold  their  robes  and  perish.  But  their  work  is  done,  and 
their  successors,  already  in  bud,  will  renew  the  gorgeous  display  the  following 
morning." — P.  182. 

Such  a  flower  might  be  held  to  symbolize  the  fleeting  glory  of  the  genera- 
tions  which  had  lived  and  died  in  Central  America.  It  still  climbs  about  the 
temples  of  the  Sun,  saluting  its  divinity  with  a  smile,  and  then  falling  prostrate 
among  the  desolate  and  forsaken  altars.       It  may  often  be  seen  twining  its  arms 


ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON.         43 


around  the  monuments  of  a  buried  Past,  or  pressing  its  lips  to  the  dust  of  the 
vanished  4:ace  it  so  speedily  follows. 

It  lives  but  a  day,  says  the  American  botanist. 

It  lives  but  a  day,  says  the  Shan  Hai  King. 

Surely  the  works  in  Arizona  are  worthy  of  the  exiled  Toltecs. 

One  of  the  ancient  stone  structures,  on  a  northern  feeder  of  the  Gila,  is  so 
strong,  commodious,  and  so  impregnably  planted  that  by  universal  consent  it  is 
called  a  Castle.  And  because  the  Indian  tribes  persist  in  ascribing  its  construc- 
tion to  Mu  or  Mo-te  it  is  known  as  "Montezuma's  Castle."  The  Ethnological 
Bureau  has  interested  itself  in  the  preservation  of  this  impressive  work  of  the 
so-called  Cliff-dwellers,  and  our  Government  has  taken  charge  of  it  as  a 
"National  Monument."  And  Ari-zona  is  named  in  honor  of  the  Ari  or  "Maiden" 
— the  legendary  Qyeen  of  the  Pimo  zona  or  Pimo  valley.  The  mother  referred 
to  in  the  ancient  Chinese  record  is  thus  remembered  in  the  title  of  a  Yankee 
sister  State. 

Her  idolized  son  is  said  to  have  governed  Forts,  and  in  the  vicinity  of  the 
Castle  we  find  a  number  of  forts.  Dr.  Fewkes  says:  "The  forts  were  built  on 
the  summits,  .  .  .  and  it  is  an  instructive  fact  in  this  connection  tha  t  one  rarely 
loses  sight  of  one  of  these  hill  forts  before  another  can  be  seen."  An 
"approaching  foe"  could  be  discerned  and  "smoke  signals'*  would  warn  field." 
workers  "to  retreat  to  the  forts  for  protection."— 28th  Rept.  Bur.  Amer.  Eth- 
nol.,  p.  207.  (Read  also  connected  pages  for  information  relating  to  the  forts 
and  their  builders.  The  same  or  an  allied  people  erected  also  houses  in  nat- 
ural caves  or  excavated  them  in  soft  rock." — P.  219.  The  latter— the  excavated 
dwellings  are  noticed  in  Asiatic  books  and  will  be  dealt  with  in  next  pamphlet 
— if  such  is  ever  written.) 

We  have  found  the  "Forts"  and  also  Pimo  (or  Pima  as  some  pronounce 
the  name) with  its  Princess  and  her  child.  And  have  we  not  found  the  Gulf 
and  Canyon  referred  to  by  the  departed  Ancients.  Have  we  not  found  every- 
thing except  perhaps  the  abandoned  imperial  Lute?  And  even  it  may  yet  be 
recovered.  Let  it  be  dug  for  at  the  Cliff  of  the  Harp.  Perhaps  it  may  yet  be 
resurrected — 

"A  Harp  that  in  darkness  and  silence  forsaken 
Has  slumbered  while  ages  rolled  slowly  along, 

Once  more  in  its  own  native  land  may  aw^aken 
And  pour  from  its  chords  all  the  raptures  of  song. 

"Unhurt  by  the  dampness  that  o'er  it  was  stealing. 

Its  strings  in  full  chorus,  resounding  sublime. 
May  'rouse  all  the  ardor  of  patriot  feeling  j 

And  gain  a  bright  wreath  from  the  relics  of  time.** 


44         ANCIENT  CHINESE  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GRAND  CANYON. 


APPENDIX 

(Note  1)  see  Mr.  Vining's  "An  Inglorious  Columbus,"  p.  659.  (2)  Jin-Chin 
Ngan's  comment  in  1 4th  Book  of  the  Shan  Hai  King.  (3)  Kane's  work.  (4)  Van 
Troil's  "Iceland,"  I,  643:  Headley's  "Island  of  Fire."  p.  100.  (5)  Dr.  Le  Plon- 
geon'8"QyeenMoo."xl,  xlii.  175.  (6)  Vining.  182.  659,  666.  (7)  Vining;  182. 
(8)  Vining  659.  (9)  Vining,  659.  (10)  see  index  for  essays  collected  by  Mr. 
Vining.  (II)  see  Chinese  version  of  Shan  Hai  King,  with  Jin-chin-ngan's  notes, 
(the  latter  being  omitted  in  Mr.  V.'s  translation,  p.  661.)  (12)  see  either  the 
Shan  Hai  King,  book  14,  or  the  translation  of  same.  (13)  Vin.  661.  (14)  Mark 
Twain's  "Roughing  It,"  p.  101.  (15)  Lieut.  Ives'  Report,  Pt.  1,  p.  23.  (16) 
Powell's  Report.  (17)  Scribners'  Mag.  Nov.  1890.  (18)  R.  R.  Co.'s  Handbook 
on  "Colorado."     (19)  Powell's  Report. 

(Note  20)  Stanton  in  Scribners'  Mag.  Nov.  1890.  (21)  Mr.  F.  A.  Ober. 
(22)  (compare  Mr.  Vining's  translations  with  original  Chinese  statement.)  (23) 
Jin-Chin-ngan's  note  (never  hitherto  translated  into  English.)  (24)  Dunraven's 
"Great  Divide."  (25)  Vin,  647.  (26)  Powell's  Report,  29,  35.  86.  (27)  Powell, 
32,  71.  (28)  Vin.  532.  (29)  Stanton.  (30)  Mr.  Clampitt's  "Echoes  from  the 
Rocky  Mts."  218.  (31)  Powell,  p.  30,  (32)  "Glimpses  of  America' '  (Phila.  1 894) 
p.  80.  (33)  Stanton.  (34)  "Glimpses."  78.  (35)  Powell.  16.30.  (36)  Ives.  Pt.  I, 
28;  ii,  p.  8.     (37)  Powell.  63,  86.     (38)  "Glimpses,"  78.     (39)  Ives,  42- 

(Note  40)  Ives'  Rept.,  Pt.  I,  p.  73.  (41)  F.  A.  Ober  in  Brooklyn  Times, 
June  19,  1897.  (42)  Sitgreaves,  17.  (43)  Ives,  66.  (44)  Ives,  III,  49.  (45) 
Powell,  125.  (46)  "Glimpses  of  Amer."  78.  (47)  Glimpses,"  83.  (48) 
Powell,  55.  60,  70.  (49)  Dellenbaugh's  "Canyon  Voyage,"  139.  (50)  Powell, 
65,76,  (51)  G.  W.  James's  "Wonders  of  the  Colorado  Desert,"  30.  (52) 
Murphy's  "Three  Wonderlands,"  137.  (53)  Powell,  35,  63,  86,  90.  (54) 
Piexot's  "Romantic  California,"  67,  144,  148.  (55)  Ives.  23.  (56)  Sacred 
Mysteries  of  the  Mayas",  90.  (57)  "Glimpses  of  Amer."  p.  82.  (58)  F.  A. 
Ober  in  the  Brooklyn  Times,  June  19,  '97.  (59)Appleton's  "New  Amer.  Cyc." 
Article  Colorado. 

(Note  60)  Sitgreaves' report,  p.  17.  (61)  Ives.  107.  (62)  Sitgreaves,  p.  18. 
(63)  Dellenbaugh's  "Canyon  Voyage,"  255.  (64)  Powell's  Report.  (65)  PoweP, 
34,  35,  124.  125.  (66)  Smithson.  Ethnol.  "Bulletin,"  No.  51,  p.  18.  (67)  Powell, 
125.  (68)  Ethnological  "Bulletin."  No.  51.  pp.  14.  15.  (69)  Bulletin.  No.  51.  p. 
19.  (70)  Johnson's  Journal  in  Emory's  "Reconn.  of  N.  Mex.."  etc..  598-9.  (71) 
Appletons'  "New  Am.  Cyc."  Article  "Casas  Grandes."  (72)  L.  B.  Prince's 
"New  Mex.."  p.  24.  (73)  Elliott  Cones  'Comments  on  Garces'  Diary,  p.  94. 
(74)  Encyc.  Americana,  vol.  X.  (75)  Vining,  411.  (76)  see  28th  character  from 
last  in  note  by  Jin  Chin  Ngan  preceding  assertion  in  text  that  the  Canyon  has  a 
beautiful  mountain  (Vining.  661.)  (77)  Morrison,  IV,  p.  601.  (78)  Jin  Chin 
Ngan.     (79)  Murphy's  "Three  Wonderlands,''  152. 

Note  (80)  Amer.  Cyc.  IV,  p.  50.  (81)  Bancroft's  "Native  Races,"  IV,  620. 
(82)  New  Internat.  Encyc.  XIII.  (83)  Penny  Cyc.  Article  "Mexico."  p.  163. 
(84)  Bancroft's  "Native  Races."  (85)  Emory,  p.  83.  (86)  Prince's  N.  Mex.  24. 
(87)  Prince's  N.  M.  24-6.  (88)  The  Shan  Hai  King,  Book  II.  section  111.  14th 
mountain.  (89)  Emory,  64.  (90)  Shan  Hai  King.  p.  83.  (91)  Mr  Spears  in  N. 
Y.  Sun.  Sept.  3.  1893.  (92)  Amer.  Antiquarian,  May,  1892.  (93)  N.  Y.  World, 
Oct.  1887.     (94)  N,  Y.  Recorder,  Feb.  19,  1893. 


